


And you may say to yourself, my god, what have I done?

by RabbitRunnah



Series: Once in a Lifetime [2]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Brief mentions of Jack's past alcohol abuse, Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2019-10-10 12:28:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 39,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17425901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RabbitRunnah/pseuds/RabbitRunnah
Summary: The last thing Jack Zimmermann remembers saying to Eric Bittle is "lucky shot." That doesn’t explain, at all, why he just woke up in Bittle’s bed.A companion piece -- this time it's Jack's turn to get a peek at his future -- toAnd you may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Never once when I was writing _And you may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?_ did I entertain the thought of writing a similar story from Jack's perspective. I actually considered writing a one-shot from Jack's POV, but a whole new version with Jack traveling through time? Ha! 
> 
> But yesterday I started thinking about how Jack would react in the same situation and it led to this. It has the same jumping off point as Bitty's story, and takes place in the same future universe, a few years later.
> 
> The title, like the title of this fic's companion piece, comes from Talking Heads' "Once in a Lifetime."

All Jack Zimmermann wants to do is go to sleep.

Usually, the high of winning a game keeps Jack awake for hours. If this were any other game, he’d head home and at least stay up rehashing the game with the guys, maybe have a beer and play a few games of Mario Kart. But the day spent with his father, followed by that humiliating moment after the game with the Bittles, has left him exhausted. Not in the way hockey makes him tired, but in a soul crushing, bone deep way that makes him want to curl up under his weighted blanket and sleep for days. The only thing standing between Jack and his bed is …

“Hey! Jack! Wait up! ‘Cause um. I just wanted to say again, good game, and thank—”

Bittle.

Bittle is the last person Jack wants to deal with right now.

“Bittle,” Jack hears himself say. “It was a lucky shot.” It’s mean and undeserved, and Jack knows it. As captain, Jack should have been the first to congratulate Bittle, who has had such a hard time finding his footing this season, on his goal.But he doesn’t. He can’t. Not tonight.

He doesn’t look back as he continues his walk back to the Haus, certain that if he does he’ll see something on Bittle’s face he doesn’t want to see.

Back at the Haus, he’s greeted by the smell of spilled beer and the heat of too many bodies. Apparently Ransom and Holster invited the rest ofSMH and the entire women’s volleyball team over to celebrate.

“It’s family weekend,” Jack reminds Shitty as he brushes past him. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“One drink, brah. Have one beer with us,” Shitty pleads, pressing a bottle into his hand. “We beat those Yale motherfuckers!”

Jack sighs and hands the bottle back to Shitty. “I’m tired.”

“Let him go man,” Jack can hear Holster say as he retreats. “You know he gets like this when his dad is here.”

Jack closes his door with a little more force than necessary. He sheds his clothes, steps into an old pair of sweatpants, and collapses into bed.

 

*

 

It’s still dark when Jack wakes, which is normal. Getting up before the sun is all he’s known for years. His head feels a little achy though, like he might be dehydrated or coming down with something. He reaches for the water bottle on his nightstand and takes a large swig before burrowing back into his pillow.  It won’t hurt to sleep in a little. He’ll just cut his run short before breakfast with Papa.

When Jack wakes again, it’s to somebody climbing into bed next to him and snuggling close. He opens his eyes. The room is bathed in sunlight but something feels wrong. The light isn’t hitting the floor at the correct angle, his pillow doesn’t smell faintly of Shitty’s weed, his head and body still feel mildly _off_.

Also, there’s a hand on his waist.

“Get off of me, Shits,” Jack grunts, swiping at the hand, which only digs in, gently poking at the ticklish spot just above his hip. “I mean it. I have to run before breakfast with my dad.”

Shitty stirs beside him and snuggles closer. His hand finds Jack’s hip again and gives his ass a little squeeze. “Let’s not get up just yet, Sweetpea,” a sweet, sleepy voice says. “You deserve to relax on your big day.” His hand creeps lower, toward Jack’s inner thigh, and …

Suddenly, Jack is wide awake. The person beside him — a man, definitely a man — is almost completely buried under blankets, but he doesn’t need to see his face to know he’s not Shitty. Shitty doesn’t call him ‘Sweetpea.’ Shitty is never _this_ handsy. Shitty doesn’t have a Southern accent.

Jack sits up, heart racing, and realizes he not in his room. He’s not in _any_ room he recognizes as being part of the Haus. This room, with its matching furniture, large windows, and soft gray walls, may be larger than the entire second floor.

“Honey?” The man next to Jack shifts and lifts his head. Slowly, a face comes into focus; Jack recognizes the eyes first. _Bittle_. His teammate Bittle, who is probably gay, but he’s never said anything and Jack has never asked. Even if he had, there’s no way Bittle would know that Jack —

Jack swallows down the bile rising in his throat and it’s all he can do to avoid a full-on panic attack. He can’t let Bittle see him like this. Whatever happened last night seems to have been okay for Bittle, but shame and humiliation eat away at Jack. How could he have let this happen _again_?

“No!” Jack yelps, breathing heavily. He can’t take his eyes off of Bittle’s. A voice in his head is telling him Bittle has really nice eyes even as a louder voice is telling him that everything about this is wrong.

Bittle places a gentle hand on Jack’s arm and smiles tenderly. “I know we had a late night, but I just put Daniel Tiger on. We still have a little while before —”

Whatever nonsense Bittle is spouting is cut off by a crash and a cry from somewhere down the hall. He frowns a little. “Or not,” he says wryly. “You stay put, I’ll deal with it. We can pick up where we left off after your parents leave tonight.” Bittle gives him a positively _dirty_ smirk and it’s all Jack can do not to scream as Bittle rolls out of bed and pulls a pair of gray joggers over his boxer briefs (Jack is _not_ looking at Bittle’s ass, he is _not_ ) before exiting the room.

Jack’s heart is still racing. What the hell did he _do_ last night? He remembers returning to the house, refusing the beer Shitty offered, going straight to bed. Did he go back downstairs for a drink? Did he have more than one? Is that why he can't remember?

He scrambles for the phone on his nightstand. It feels too large in his hand and he fumbles with it for a moment, nearly dropping it, but it unlocks easily enough and he quickly finds his father in his contacts.

“Jack?” Papa’s voice is gravelly, like he’s just woken up. “It’s early, what’s going on?”

Jack tries to swallow down his panic. “Papa, I … I messed up. Bittle, I —” Jack takes a deep gasping breath and tries again. Though they still have a way to go, the fact that he’s about to confess to his father that he got blackout drunk and fucked a teammate is a testament to just how much their relationship has improved. He wouldn’t normally talk to his father about his sex life, but he also doesn’t know who else he can talk to at this point. For all he and Shitty tell each other, Shitty is only partially aware of his history with alcohol and not at all aware of his history of sleeping with blond teammates. No, Papa is the person he needs to talk to right now.

“Jack, slow down, I can’t hear you,” Papa says, and his gentle tone gives Jack time to collect his thoughts. “Can you take a few deep breaths?”

Jack inhales and exhales deeply, eight times. “Bittle and I … I think—” his voice breaks again.

“Did something happen to Bitty or one of the kids?” Papa asks sharply.

Kids? Oh, god, what _happened_ last night? Were the other frogs involved?

“I don’t know, Papa,” Jack says, tears beginning to prick behind his eyes. “I don’t remember last night. After the …”

“That must've been some party last night if you can't remember it, eh?”

What? No. Why is his father being so cavalier about this? Jack tries again. “I think I ...”

“Jack. Is Bitty with you? Can you tell me where you are right now?”

“I’m —” All Jack knows is that he’s in a strange room he has no memory of bringing Bittle to.

“Hey, hang on, I just got a text from Bitty,” Papa says. “Wow, lucky you. I’d say in a few seconds you’re going to get a huge —”

“Surprise!”

Jack nearly drops the phone as the door flies open and two tiny _things_ hurl themselves at him, knocking (what’s left of) the wind out of him. Bittle’s standing in the doorway, grinning and holding a tray piled high with what appears to be breakfast: eggs, muffins, a bowl of fruit.

“Papa! Happy birthday!” the larger thing (it’s a _child_ , Jack’s brain helpfully supplies) shrieks.

“Papa birfday!” parrots the smaller child.

“Papa, I think I should call you back,” Jack says, now even more confused than before. Where did Bittle find these kids?

Papa chuckles. “Happy birthday, son. Your mother and I will see you at dinner.”

Jack lets the phone drop to the floor as the children continue to pin him to the mattress.

“All right, you two, let Papa breathe,” Bittle says through laughter. “Carter, would you like to help me serve breakfast?” He winks at Jack. “ _Someone_ was so tired after his big party last night he didn’t even notice we got up early to bake.”

The larger child scrambles off the bed and runs toward Bittle, who hands him a muffin. He races back to Jack and climbs onto the bed, more carefully this time. “We made these, Papa,” the boy — Jack isn’t a great judge of age, but he must be about four — says. “Cherry chocolate chip. Your favorite.”

Jack is one hundred percent certain he has never eaten a cherry chocolate chip anything in his entire life.

“My muffin,” the smaller child, who might be a girl, says. She rolls over onto her back and bats dark eyelashes up at Jack.

“Yours is right here, sweetie pie,” Bittle says, crossing the room and setting his tray at the foot of the bed before coming around and sliding back into bed next to Jack. “Carter, hon, sit right here,” he says, making a space between himself and Jack. The little boy climbs over Jack and his sister (?) and settles into the spot. To Jack’s horror, the girl has begun to climb into his lap.

Bittle leans forward and picks three more muffins off of the tray. “See, there’s enough for everyone,” he says as he hands one to each of the children. Immediately, Jack is covered in crumbs as the girl shifts a little and crushes her muffin against his chest.

To be fair, they are adorable children, even Jack can see that. The boy has a cap of golden curls and giant brown eyes. The girl, in contrast, has blue eyes and darker hair, though both have the same dimpled, round cheeks. They’re dressed in coordinating, rainbow-striped pajamas — the boy in soft shorts and a t-shirt, the girl in a one-piece that snaps over her diaper.

“Happy birthday, old man,” Bittle says, and the look he gives Jack terrifies him more than anything else about this morning — the waking up together, the forgetting last night, the children — because it’s a look of pure _love_.

And also because the words “old man” trigger something. For the first time, Jack really looks at Bittle and sees, beyond the smile and affection, signs that more than just a night has passed. Because when Jack last saw Bittle his hair was longer, his were cheeks slightly fuller, his body was slight and scrawny. The Bittle sitting next to him is still lean and compact but there’s a bit of heft to him now, his clingy t-shirt hinting at the broader chest and solid biceps beneath. And the little lines in the corners of his eyes that Jack initially mistook for smile lines are, he realizes, tiny wrinkles. Now that Jack has noticed it’s impossible _not_ to notice.

“Bittle, you —” Jack’s words catch in his throat. He will very much _not_ think about how attractive he finds Bittle right now.

“You didn’t think last night was the only party you were gonna get, did you?” Bittle bumps his shoulder. “The kids wanted to do something for you too. As soon as everyone is dressed we’re going to the zoo. Get that over with before it gets too hot, then Carter asked if we can go to the pool after Birdy’s nap. Of course, it’s _your_ birthday, so just let me know if you’d rather have a quiet day at home. We have dinner with your parents at five-thirty, and they said they’d keep the kids for the weekend because I got us a room at —”

“ _Bittle_ ,” Jacks says, hoping his voice conveys every bit of the urgency he feels right now. “How old am I?”

Bittle giggles and bumps shoulders again. “Papa’s so silly, isn’t he?” he asks the kids. “How old is Papa today?”

Next to him, the little boy — Carter — giggles. “Forty-four!” he shrieks, waving his muffin in the air. Crumbs rain down onto the bed.

“Four!” the toddler — Birdy? — in Jack’s lap says.

“No, Birdy, _forty_ -four,” Carter says in exasperation. “Daddy, she keeps saying —”

“I know, Carter,” Bittle says patiently. “Your sister’s little, she’s still learning. Birdy, hon, Carter is four. Papa’s _forty_ -four today.” Bittle primly takes a bite of his own muffin.

“How old are you again, Daddy?” Carter asks.

“Younger than Papa,” Bittle says smugly. He winks at Jack. 

_Crisse_. It seems impossible, but this is too elaborate to be a prank and it doesn’t feel like a dream. It also doesn’t seem to be a mistake. Somehow, this is Jack’s life. A very much planned-for and _wanted_ life, by the looks of it. A happy life.

“Oh! I almost forgot!” Bittle pulls the tray closer and plucks a single blue birthday candle from it. “Birdy, can you put this in Papa’s muffin?”

Jack watches the little girl carefully stick the candle in the top of the muffin while Bittle rummages in the nightstand. “Knew I left one of these in here!” he says happily, brandishing a lighter. “Where’s that muffin?”

“Here!” Birdy says, holding out the now-candle-topped muffin.

“Thank you, Birdy. Can you give that back to Papa? Now, I’m going to light this very carefully while we sing.”

What follows is a hybrid English-French version of the birthday song, sung slightly off key by Bittle and Carter. Birdy sways back and forth and cheerfully singsongs “birfday.”

“Now you have to make a wish, Papa,” Carter says.

“Oh, I think I know what Papa’s gonna wish for,” Bittle says, hand creeping under the blankets and coming to rest on Jack’s thigh.

“What are you gonna wish for?” Carter asks.

Jack swallows hard and looks at the tiny flame burning in front of him. _I wish I knew what the hell is going on_.


	2. Chapter 2

Until today, if you had asked Jack if he believes in magic, or time travel, the answer would have been an unequivocal “no.” Sometimes, when Shitty is particularly blitzed, he’ll drag Jack out onto the roof and ramble about destiny and parallel universes, but Jack has always assumed his “insights” are a byproduct of the weed rather than a firsthand knowledge of the subject.

Now, he’s still certain Shitty isn’t a secret time traveler, but at least he understands where he’s coming from. Because there’s simply no other way to explain all of _this_.

As the family breakfast in bed continues, Jack has a lot of questions:

  * How did 20 years pass in a single night?
  * Why are he and Bittle ... Well, what happened there?
  * Why are he and Bittle raising these kids together? (He assumes the answer is related to the previous question.)
  * Bittle is clearly a middle-aged man. What is Jack going to see when he looks in the mirror?
  * And, perhaps the most pressing of all: Where have these muffins been all of his life?



He only voices the last, and is rewarded with a second muffin from Bittle. “You flatter me. But if you must know, I used different cherries this time. You really like them? I was worried they’d be too different.”

“They’re good,” Jack says. He suddenly feels just a little bit guilty for all of the chirps about Bittle’s baking that came out a little too harsh. Obviously, he knows what he’s doing.

“Only the best for my Sweetpea,” Bittle says affectionately.

“Sweepy,” Birdy echoes, setting her muffin in Jack’s lap and burrowing her face into his chest.

“Can I have another muffin?” Carter asks.

“How about some eggs first?” Bittle suggests. “You know what Papa says —”

“I know,” Carter says with a sigh of resignation, “protein is important.” He lets Bittle scoop some eggs onto a small plate and promptly devours them. “Now can I have another muffin?”

Bittle laughs and drops another muffin onto Carter’s plate. “I think this one must be gearing up for a growth spurt,” he says, nudging Jack. “Those shoes we bought him last month are already a little tight.”

It’s all so domestic.

There was a time, not so long ago, when Jack didn’t see much of a future for himself outside of hockey. Then, for a little while, he didn’t see a future at all. He’s spent the past five years working toward taking some of it back — hockey is almost certain, and if that doesn’t work out he’ll have his degree. He’s never allowed himself to think about what might lie beyond hockey and college. He’s never considered what else he might want.

A few weeks ago, Papa had asked him if he was “seeing anybody” he might want to introduce him to during family weekend. “You know, like that girl on the tennis team. Or,” he’d said, lowering his voice a little even though he was alone in his home gym and Jack was alone in his room, “a boy.”

Papa and Maman had known about Kent.

“I have hockey,” Jack had said, and that had been the end of that.

Jack had chalked Papa’s interest in Bittle up to his frankly amazing story (even Jack can admit that going from figure skating to no-checking rec hockey to NCAA hockey is a big deal), and the guys talking up his pies. Now he wonders if he’d seen something else in Bittle that Jack isn’t — _wasn’t_ — ready to see.

Jack isn’t sure he can articulate, even to himself, why Bittle rubs him the wrong way. Certainly, he’s guilty of making assumptions — some of which weren’t exactly wrong — based on Bittle’s appearance. The checking issue hasn’t exactly inspired confidence, even as his other assets on the ice have become obvious. Jack knows it’s important to have a well-rounded team, that Bittle’s speed is an asset. But right now he’s a liability, and Jack can’t afford another liability in his life. At least, that’s what he tells himself when he’s slamming Bittle into the boards at 4:30 in the morning.

When, he wonders, did Bittle go from being a liability to a necessity?

Seated beside him, Bittle is blissfully unaware of Jack’s internal crisis. Time has changed him, but he’s still recognizably himself — cheerful, generous, kind. He’s good with the kids. He obviously still bakes —a lot, if the professional quality of muffins is any indication. He loves Jack and Jack cannot, for the life of him, figure out why.

By the time breakfast is over, Jack has heard Carter relate the plot of an episode a cartoon he refers to as “The Bears” three times (not that he was able to follow any of it), he’s been (accidentally) kicked in the chest by a wiggly Birdy, and the bed is covered in crumbs.

“Everyone needs a bath!” Bittle announces, hopping out of bed. “Sweetpea, you go ahead and shower while I get these two ready.”

As soon as Jack steps out of bed, a current of pain shoots through his left knee. Bittle doesn’t miss his wince, or his sharp intake of breath.

“Oh, hon.” He places a steadying hand on Jack’s shoulder.

“Hurts,” Jack grits out.

“I know. You’re going to feel so much better after your surgery next week,” Bittle says reassuringly.

Jack would like to process that, but a small hand is tugging at the leg of his sleep pants. “Rawr, Papa! We’re tigers!” Carter says from the floor.

“Raaaaarrrr!”

“All right, little tigers,” Bittle says, laughing, “we need to get ready if we’re going to see the real tigers. Carter, can you take Birdy to your bathroom and help her wash her hands? I’ll be right there.”

The kids _crawl_ out of the room, roaring all the way.

“What a mess!” Bittle shakes his head at the crumb-strewn bed. “Lord, what was I thinking, going with cherry? The kids would’ve been just as happy with doughnuts.”

“I’ll start a load of laundry,” Jack says, already stripping the sheets from the bed. If he has to play the role of devoted husband and father, laundry is a good place to start. Laundry is something he can do.

“These sheets may be a lost cause,” Bittle says, frowning at a cherry stain. “But put a scoop of OxyClean in there anyway. If it doesn’t come out we can use ‘em for Daisy’s bed.”

Jack holds the bundle of linens tightly to his chest as he makes his way down the hallway, ducking his head into every open door in hopes it leads to the laundry room.

On autopilot, he shoves the sheets into the washing machine and finds the soap in a cabinet. Future washing machines are still reasonably user friendly. Jack turns it on and sinks to the floor. Back against the door, he puts his head between his knees and attempts to breathe. _One … two … three …_

How did he get here? Why now? Will he ever get back?

_… four … five … six …_

“Jack? Honey, are you still in there?” Bittle’s voice sounds far away, but it’s enough to pull Jack out of his own head. “I just got a text from your dad. He said he got a strange call from you earlier. Are you feeling okay?”

Slowly, carefully, Jack gets to his feet, careful to avoid putting too much weight on his left knee. Bittle’s on the other side of the door when he slides it open. He’s dressed and his hair is a little wet. His large eyes are full of … Not pity. Concern. How long was Jack dissociating?

“Just a little confused when I woke up,” Jack says truthfully.

“It was the wine,” Bittle says with certainty. “When’s the last time we had more than one glass?” He answers his own question. “When we found out about Birdy, probably. Or was it the last book going to press? Either way, both would’ve been almost three years ago."

Using context clues, Jack can just about piece together Bittle’s narrative. “Maybe no wine tonight, then,” he suggests.

“You sure everything else is okay though?” Bittle asks quietly. “Your dad’s a little worried and I am too. You’ve seemed kind of out of it all morning.”

“It’s my knee,” Jack says. Another truth.

“More than usual?”

Jack nods. If the usual is _nothing_ , then yes.

“Make sure you wear your brace today. I don’t want you forgetting,” Bittle says, emphasizing “forgetting” with air quotes. “Oh! I almost forgot why I came in here. Can you see if Carter’s tiger shirt is in that pile of dirty clothes? He wants to wear it to see the tigers at the zoo but I can’t find it in his room.”

Jack paws through the hamper sitting on top of the dryer, pulling items out one by one. Toddler clothes are tiny. And kind of cute.

“Euh, this one?” he asks, holding up a blue shirt decorated with tiny cartoon tigers and a red stain that might be ketchup.

Bittle wrinkles his nose. “That’s the one. I had a feeling it was dirty. He can wear the blue stripes today.” He takes a step closer to Jack, places a hand on his hip. “Are you sure you’re okay? Do you want me to sit with you for a bit?”

“I think I’m good,” Jack says, shrugging Bittle off. “I should shower.”

Bittle follows him into their bedroom. “I’ll go start packing the diaper bag,” he says as Jack heads into the bathroom.

Bittle, kids, _surgery_ … Jack isn’t sure he can take anymore surprises this morning but he can’t put of the inevitable. In the privacy of their bathroom — and if there’s one benefit to this new life, it’s that he no longer has to share a bathroom with Shitty — he faces his future self for the first time.

He’s expecting to look older. What he’s not expecting to see, when he looks at himself in the mirror, is his father looking back at him. His hair has even gone gray in the same places. His eyes, the same color as his mother’s, have the same lines he’s begun to notice around his father’s.

The rest of him isn’t 23 anymore, either, he realizes when he takes off his shirt and discovers he no longer has the body of a top NHL prospect. And there’s his knee. Hockey is obviously over. He missed it all.

“I’m old,” he whispers to his reflection.

“Yeah, you are,” Bittle says fondly, coming in and joining Jack at the mirror. He snakes an arm around his waist and pulls him close, a move Jack allows because his brain is still trying to process all of this. “Still the most handsome man I know, though.” He rises up and plants a kiss on the underside of Jack’s jaw.

Jack has his father’s face and the comfortable, lived-in body of a 44-year-old dad. Bittle doesn’t seem fazed by either.

“You sound like my mother.”

“Well, we have good taste.” He lightly smacks Jack’s ass. “Hurry up with that shower, Mr. Bittle-Zimmermann; the kids are raring to go.”

“I’ll be quick,” Jack assures Bittle. “Can you, uh, do me a favor?”

“Of course.”

“Pick something out for me to wear? Maybe … something you like?” Last week in the locker room he overheard Bittle and Ransom lecturing Holster on “proper first date attire.” It sounds like the sort of request that will make Bittle happy.

“If I must,” Bittle says with an exaggerated sigh.

Jack’s utilitarian shower at the Haus is a dark, narrow box that was never meant to accommodate the average hockey player. There’s barely enough room for him to turn around, let alone bend down to grab his shampoo or a dropped bar of soap. He has to duck a little to fit under the shower head. The water pressure leaves a lot to be desired, and if he doesn’t get the first morning shower he forfeits any hope of hot water. It’s fine. It gets the job done.

This shower, in contrast, is akin to the luxury day spas and resorts his parents like to visit. It’s outfitted with multiple body sprays and a built-in bench. Jack can extend his arms without touching the walls. It’s nothing short of a refuge, a place he can imagine unwinding after a tough game or other vigorous activities. It’s a big space; there’s no question it was built to be shared with a partner.

As hot water hits him from every direction, Jack squeezes his eyes shut and prays that when he opens them, he’ll miraculously be in his own much crappier shower, in his own time, far away from all of this. That’s how it works in the movies, right?

Even before Jack opens his eyes, he knows it didn’t work. He can hear Bittle humming to himself in the next room. Jack can hide in this shower forever, but it isn’t going to change anything.

Bittle has laid Jack’s clothes — cargo shorts and a soft blue t-shirt — out on the bed. The shirt’s luxe fabric and fine details hint at something a little more upscale than the basic Under Armour or SMH tees he usually wears. A black knee brace sits next to the clothes.

“It matches your eyes,” Bittle says simply as Jack pulls the shirt over his head. He presses something into Jack’s hand. “Found this on the floor.”

It’s Jack’s phone, which he’d all but forgotten in the morning’s chaos. He swipes his thumb over the screen to see several notifications, most greeting him with a variation of “Happy birthday!” Some of the names, like Shitty and Maman, are familiar. Others, like George and Tater, are unknown — but apparently they’re close enough friends they send Jack personal messages on his birthday. He slips it into one of his pockets.

“Ready?” Bittle asks as Jack finishes adjusting the brace around his knee.

“Ready,” Jack says, not feeling ready at all.

*

The zoo is not a disaster.

Maman used to take him the Franklin Park Zoo when he was little, when they'd come into Boston to watch Papa play against the Bruins. It’s his first clue that they live near Boston, that he hasn’t strayed far from Samwell. Or that he eventually made his way back? The “how” of it all is still a mystery. Did he sign with the Bruins after Samwell? Or did he miss his second chance at hockey as well, and decide to stick around? Were he and Bittle a thing even then?

He doesn’t have a lot of time to ponder these questions because parenting two small kids in a busy zoo is more mentally and physically taxing than Jack would have guessed. He has to give most of the credit to Bittle, who pilots Birdy’s stroller through the grounds while diffusing any potential meltdowns. Carter wants to see the snakes. Birdy wants to see the bats. Both kids want to see the tigers and the camels.

“I want to see the gorilla!” Carter says after they’ve hit all of the “must-sees” on their lists.

Birdy’s eyes grow wide. “No, no,” she whimpers, shaking her head.

“I’ll take him to see the gorilla,” Jack offers.

“Yay!” Carter cheers.

Bittle shoots Jack a grateful look. “I’ll take her to see the red panda again,” he says.

Carter slips a small hand into Jack’s. “Let’s go!”

“Euh … Can you lead the way, bud? I can’t remember where he is.”

Carter grins. “It’s this way!”

This strategy — play dumb, let Carter feel smart — turns out to work in Jack’s favor. He lets the boy lead him through the zoo until they’re standing in front of the gorilla’s habitat. “He’s so nice,” Carter says, waving at the animal.

Jack chuckles. “I used to like the gorilla too,” he tells him. Carter looks up at him with Bittle’s eyes and smile and squeezes his hand. Jack returns the smile and squeezes back. 

Bittle and Birdy are sitting on a bench, sharing a pretzel when Jack and Carter return. “I want a pretzel!” Carter pouts.

Bittle pulls a second pretzel from a pocket on the side of Birdie’s diaper bag. “You and Papa can share this one,” he says, splitting it in half.

“We need a picture,” Bittle says, pulling out his phone, “to remember Papa’s birthday. Carter, look at me. Jack, hon, come a little closer.”

Jack slides a little closer until all four are visible on Bitty’s screen — Carter in his lap, Birdy in Bittle's. “Everybody growl like a tiger,” Bittle instructs.

Everybody growls, and Jack falls a little bit in love with his family.

 *

“I’m beat!” Bittle says dramatically as they load everything and everyone into their sleek SUV. “Lunch at home, then naps for everyone.”

“Can I watch my train movie instead?” Carter asks.

“Naps for _everyone_ ,” Bittle emphasizes. “If you and Papa wanna _nap_ on the couch while I bake Papa’s birthday cake, that’s fine.” He winks at Jack as the car begins to back itself out of its parking space.

Jack relaxes into the passenger seat, more than ready to get home and ice his knee. The smooth drive and the quiet, rambling conversation between the kids in the back seat almost lull him to sleep, but he snaps back to reality when he phone vibrates with another incoming message.

 _“Hope you’re having a fun day at the zoo! I’m sure the kids will tell us all about it tonight. Tell Bitty the picture is adorable. Also, we just saw the article on Boston Sports. We’re proud of you, today and every day.”_

Maman’s message is followed by a link. “What’s that?” Bittle asks, glancing at the phone in Jack’s lap.

“My mother sent an article.”

“Oh! The Boston Sports article. I forgot that was going up today. I can’t wait to read it.”

Jack begins to read.

 

 

 

> Retired Boston Bruins forward Jack Zimmermann will be honored by Mayor Greenberg next month. 
> 
> The Mayor’s Youth Council Award, established in 2020, recognizes individuals and organizations who have made a positive impact on Boston’s youth. Zimmermann, who retired as the Bruins’ captain after a successful Stanley Cup run three years ago, has spent his retirement volunteering with and funding youth hockey teams and camps in some of the area’s most economically depressed areas.
> 
> Earlier this year, Trevor Lerner and Mackenzie Vang became the first recipients of Samwell University’s Zimmermann Scholarship, which is earmarked specifically for student athletes who come from less-than-privileged backgrounds.
> 
> “So often we say ‘you can play’ — and I mean no disrespect to You Can Play; both my husband and my father have served on that organization’s advisory board — but it still means we’re only including a certain type of athlete,” Zimmermann says. “There are still barriers to entry in a sport like hockey that many families aren’t equipped to overcome. And when the sport excludes kids who can’t pay for new equipment every year, or who don’t have transportation to their local rink, it misses out on a great deal of talent.”
> 
> Statistically speaking, he continues, “most kids won’t make it to the NHL, but college is often within reach.”
> 
> Higher education is important to Zimmermann, a Samwell alum. Longtime hockey fans remember the story: Hockey prodigy Zimmermann, son of hockey legend “Bad” Bob Zimmermann, overdosed on prescription anxiety medication on the eve of the 2009 NHL draft. Many expected him to return to the sport right away, but he surprised many by opting to attend Samwell — his mother, model/actress Alicia Zimmermann, is an alumna — and play NCAA hockey there, instead.
> 
> “I needed to prove to myself I was worthy of playing at that level again,” he says now, “but I also knew how quickly things could go south. Hockey wasn’t a certainty after my overdose. A college degree was something I would always have.”
> 
> Samwell was good to Zimmermann — he captained the men’s hockey team for three of his four years, and signed with the Providence Falconers shortly before he graduated with his bachelor’s degree.
> 
> “Samwell gave me a lot,” he says. “An education, a second chance at hockey, my family.”
> 
> He smiles when he mentions his family, and spends several minutes talking about how his husband, celebrity chef Eric Bittle, recently catered a private event hosted by the Obama Foundation. Over the years, reporters have learned the best way to get the famously reticent Zimmermann to open up is to ask about his husband.
> 
> Zimmermann and Bittle were teammates at Samwell before they began dating shortly after Zimmermann’s graduation. After leading Providence to a Stanley Cup win in 2016, Zimmermann publicly acknowledged the relationship and came out as bisexual. The two married in 2023, and have two young children.
> 
> As the first out athlete in the NHL, Zimmermann unintentionally paved the way for other LGBTQ hockey players to come out. “I wasn’t trying to make a statement,” he still insists of the on-ice kiss that served as his very public coming out. “I just wanted to kiss my boyfriend the same way my teammates were able to kiss their wives and girlfriends after that win.”
> 
> Being the first wasn’t always easy, he admits.
> 
> “The Falconers, from management on down, made it clear there was no room for bigotry in the organization, but players on opposing teams will look for any weakness, and yeah, I heard some things,” he says now. “It probably made me more more of a target for a little while. I got in more fights that first year than I did in the next five years combined. But it was worth it.
> 
> "At the same time I came out, my husband was the first openly gay NCAA hockey captain. A year later, the Schooners became the first team to draft an openly gay player. Now we see openly LGBTQ athletes competing in all levels of the sport. Eric and I helped people see that one’s sexuality is not a barrier to competing, and that’s not something either of us takes for granted. I’m proud to have been first NHL player to kiss his boyfriend on the ice, but I’m even more proud I wasn’t the last.”
> 
> Many expected Zimmermann to take a role in management or coach at the collegiate level upon his retirement, but he upended expectations again when he announced he’d be taking some time to return to Samwell for his master’s degree and to be a stay-at-home parent.
> 
> “It’s been nice to slow down for the first time since I was a teenager in Juniors. My husband likes to chirp me about how long it’s taking me to finish my master’s, but there will be time when the kids are in school. Right now my life is a lot of diapers and dino chicken nuggets. We go to Kindermusik and story time at the library. I do all the photography for Eric’s cookbooks and we travel with him when he films on location. And of course, I volunteer. Right now, one class a semester is enough.”
> 
> Eventually, he says, he’d like to teach and coach at the high school level.
> 
> “That’s where I seem to be headed, eh? I’ve had offers to coach at some elite prep schools, but kids at those schools will always have access to the best education and coaching money can buy. I hope to end up at a public school, working with kids similar to those I work with now.
> 
> “I was able to thrive in spite of mistakes I made as a teenager thanks to money and my family’s connections,” Zimmermann continues. “Most kids aren’t that fortunate. Some will never have a shot at that kind of opportunity to begin with. We want to give them that shot.”

 

It’s … a lot. Again, the realization that hockey happened and Jack totally missed it hits him hard. He got everything he wanted — and more — and he didn’t get to enjoy any of it. Somewhere, he supposes, there are pictures and videos and old t-shirts, but right now his aching knee is his only evidence of the career he supposedly had.

It feels like a cruel joke.

At the same time, the fact that the article exists is proof he’s finally okay. Whatever he had to go through to get here seems to have been worth it. The Jack depicted in the article sounds so _content_ Jack almost doesn’t recognize himself. He sets his phone down and tries to take it all in.

“Good article?” Bittle asks, glancing at Jack.

“Yeah,” Jack says, a little overwhelmed. “Great article.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter includes a scene at a pool in which a child wanders away from her caregivers. If you find this sort of scenario upsetting, you may want to skip that part.

Jack Zimmermann is an excellent actor.

For all Jack is compared to his father, he does take after his mother in some ways. He has her blue eyes and her sense of humor, and he’s not a bad actor when he needs to be. It’s how he was able to hide his anxiety and addiction from his parents — from everybody — for as long as he did. So it’s easy to pretend to be Jack Bittle-Zimmermann.

It’s easy to pretend when they pull into the garage and carry two tired kids into the house. It’s easy to pretend when he joins Bittle in the kitchen to make lunch. While Bittle begins making sandwiches, Jack finds strawberries and peaches in the fridge and cuts them into bite-sized pieces. They work efficiently, moving around each other in a way that feels natural. In the corner, the kids mimic their kitchen choreography at a small playset stocked with wooden food and tiny pots and pans.

“Try this, Papa,” Carter says, handing him a plastic plate.

Jack awkwardly takes the plate and stares at what appears to be a slice of pizza topped with banana slices. “This looks … yummy.” The word sounds foreign coming out of his mouth.

Carter beams up at him. “Are you going to try it?”

Jack opens his mouth wide and pretends to take a bite, makes exaggerated chewing movements. “Mmm,” he says, patting his belly. “This is delicious.”

Carter breaks into hysterical laughter. “It’s gorilla pizza! You’re eating gorilla pizza.”

Behind him, a snicker from Bittle and a shriek from Birdy.

“Oh, I forgot,” Carter whispers, eyes large the way Bittle’s get when Jack gets on his case about how he needs to take hockey more seriously. “Papa’s not a gorilla, Birdy-Bird. This is tiger pizza. Right, Papa?”

“Grawrrrr,” Jack growls. Both kids giggle.

See? Acting.

*

“I’ll put this little one to bed,” Bittle says, helping Birdy out of her booster when everyone has finished eating. “Papa,” he says with a wink in Jack’s direction, “can you help Carter get ready for his nap?”

Carter grins at Jack as Bittle and Birdy head upstairs. “Papa,” he whispers, tugging at Jack hand, “when Birdy goes to sleep we can watch my train movie. I’ll get my things.”

Apparently, Carter needs a floppy stuffed rabbit and a small wooden train engine in order to watch his movie. He clutches one in each hand as he climbs onto Jack’s lap. “I’m being careful of your knee,” he says seriously, handing the rabbit to Jack so he can turn the TV on and set up the recording.

Bittle wanders through the media room on his way to the kitchen. “My boys,” he sighs, hand to his heart.

Jack is pleasantly surprised when the “train movie” turns out not be an episode of _Thomas & Friends_, but instead a kid-friendly documentary about a trans-Canadian train trip. Carter is fascinated, and Jack kind of is, too. It’s the sort of thing he would have loved at Carter’s age. 

Carter sighs happily and relaxes against Jack’s chest. “I just love trains, don’t you, Papa?”

“I do,” Jack agrees.

Based on appearance, Jack assumes Carter is — biologically — Bittle’s. He has the same brown eyes and blond hair, the same slight build as the Bittle back at Samwell. But his quiet, serious demeanor reminds Jack of himself at four. Hockey was always first in his heart, but when it wasn’t an option he could spend hours watching nature programs and lining up his toy trains. He always traveled with two or three books, even if it was just to the rink for one of Papa’s games. He wonders, now, about nature versus nurture, and how much of Carter’s personality comes from his own quiet way of looking at the world.

Bittle joins them on the couch midway through the movie. “I used to take a train to visit Papa when he was living in Providence and I was still in college,” he says. “Remember that, honey? Lord, the best part of my week was stepping off that train and seeing you there waiting for me.”

“Shh, Daddy. We’re trying to watch the movie.”

Bittle stops talking but meets Jack’s eye over Carter’s head. His mouth quirks up in a little half-smile and Jack can’t help but wonder what good memory Bittle’s thinking of.

Jack and Carter end up dozing off before the movie is over. When he wakes, Carter is lying heavy against his chest and Bittle has left. He hears whistling coming from the kitchen.

Jack shifts a little to bring feeling back into his right arm, which has fallen asleep pinned between Carter and the arm of the couch. Carter’s eyes snap open. “Is it time to go to the pool?”

“Go ask Daddy,” Jack says, eager to pass this one off to Bittle.

Wide awake now, Carter slides off the couch and hits the ground running. “Daddy, can we go to the pool now?”

Jack can’t quite make out the muffled conversation but Carter fills him in when he returns. “Daddy said you can take me to the pool, and he’ll bring Birdy when she wakes up.”

“That sound good, Sweetpea?” Bittle calls from the kitchen. “It’ll give me time to frost your cake. It still has to cool.”

Jack swallows. He can do this. “Sounds good.”

*

Jack didn’t know getting ready to take one child to the pool was such a lengthy, labor intensive process. But they have to track down Carter’s swimsuit and rash guard, get him dressed, and apply sunscreen. They have to pack a bag with towels and toys. Jack has to track down his own swim trunks, which he finally finds folded in one of the dresser drawers in the bedroom he shares with Bittle. Then they lose another five minutes looking for one of Carter’s water shoes.

“Oh, I know where I left it!” Carter exclaims after they’ve searched the mudroom, back porch, and laundry room. Jack follows him into the kids’ playroom and watches as he unearths the shoe in question from underneath a pile of blocks.

Jack suddenly has a new appreciation for his parents, who had to wrestle him into pads and skates and corral all of his equipment when he was Carter’s age.

“Are you ready, Papa?” Carter asks as he affixes the Velcro strap on his shoe.

“I think I forgot where the pool is,” Jack says, hoping his zoo strategy will work a second time. “Can you show me how to get there?”

Carter is all too happy to lead the way.

*

The pool is great, until it isn’t.

Things start out fine. The neighborhood pool complex has two pools: a shallow toddler pool with a “beach” entry, and a larger pool with an impressive water slide. Jack and Carter spend a pleasant hour together, first going down the slide, then practicing the strokes Carter has been learning in his swim lessons. They’re in line for the slide again when Carter begins bouncing on his toes and waving madly. “Daddy!” he calls.”Come slide with me!”

Jack follows Carter’s gaze to the other side of the pool, where Bittle is setting a backpack on the lounge chair Jack claimed earlier. Bittle looks up. “Be right there, hon! Birdy and I are almost ready!”

Jack watches as Bittle sets Birdy on the chair and helps her into a swim vest. He watches as Bittle steps out of his flip flops and kicks them under the chair. He watches as Bittle takes his shirt off and …

Jack’s jaw drops.

Bittle is … hot. He’s a hot dad. He's definitely put on some muscle since his frog year. His swim trunks are shorter and more stylish than Jack’s, though not so short that it looks like he’s trying too hard to cling to his youth. Still, they expose a good amount of leg, enough that Jack can tell he's still keeping up with some sort of fitness routine. Running, maybe? The most attractive thing about him, though, is how comfortable he seems in his own skin. He carries himself with a confidence Jack has yet to see him display on the ice.

“Papa, it’s our turn,” Carter says, tugging him toward the steps leading to the top of the slide. “Let’s go.”

Jack reluctantly tears his eyes away from Bittle and follows Carter up the steps, only a little distressed by this strange new discovery.

When they meet Bittle and Birdy back at the chairs, they’re greeted by two bright smiles and Birdy’s happy babbling.

“Having fun?” Bittle asks.

“It’s a little warm,” Jack replies. Whether it’s the sun, his newfound feelings, or his sudden self-consciousness over having Bittle’s eyes roaming over him, he isn’t sure. Which is a new thing. Jack has spent his life in locker rooms, he’s used to seeing and being seen. He’s seen Bittle wearing less than he is now and never once been affected. And yet …

“Here,” Bittle says, rummaging in the backpack and pulling out a bottle of water. He unscrews the lid and takes a sip before handing it to Jack.

Jack drinks like he’s been parched for days. It feels weirdly intimate, to put his lips where Bittle’s have just been.

“Easy there.” Bittle smirks, like he knows exactly what sort of thoughts have been running through Jack’s head. 

“Uh, want some more?”

“Swim?” Birdy pipes up.

“Yes, honey, let’s swim.” Bittle hoists Birdy onto his hip and walks into the toddler pool. Jack and Carter follow. When the kids tire of splashing and filling buckets with water and dumping them on their fathers and each other, Bittle offers to take Carter to the bigger pool for just a few minutes longer.

“Watch us, Papa and Birdy,” Carter orders as Jack settles down at the edge of the pool with Birdy and a couple of her plastic cups. She’s small but solid, not unlike Jack was as a toddler, based on the baby pictures he’s seen. Cuter, though. Much cuter.

“We’re watching!” Jack calls. In his lap, Birdy pours water from one cup to the other, spilling a little onto the concrete each time.

“Daddy said I can jump in!” Carter yells.

Several things happen in quick succession.

“Papa! Watch me jump!” Carter shouts from the other side of the pool. Bittle stands a trusting-but-safe distance behind him, ready to jump in after him if necessary. The sunlight plays off his blond hair, giving him a halo-like aura.

“Cup!” Birdy yells, shifting a bit in Jack’s lap.

Carter jumps. Jack cheers. Bittle looks at Jack across the pool and shrieks something unintelligible, a primal, animalistic sound.

And that’s when Jack realizes Birdy isn’t sitting in his lap. She’s in the water, face a picture of shock, blue eyes wide with fear. Her red cup bobs up and down beside her.

Jack reflexively jumps in and pulls her close as Bittle arrives at their side. “Oh my lord, Jack, what happened? Weren’t you watching her?” he demands as Jack emerges from the water, Birdy clinging to his neck.

“I —” Jack is interrupted by a cough. He doesn't have time to react before Birdy spits a stream of pool water up all over his shoulder. Then the crying begins.

Bittle rubs her back in slow, soothing circles. “Thank god I made her wear her vest. Birdy, hon, you’re okay. That was a little scary, but you're gonna be fine.” As Bittle continues to rub her back, Carter quietly comes to stand by his side.

“Is Birdy okay?”

Jack hears the note of fear in his son’s voice and wants to die.

“She’s fine, sweetheart,” Bittle says. “Just a little scared, I think. Baby girl, you need to tell me or Papa next time you want to go in the water, okay?”

Birdy buries her face in Jack’s neck, covering him in a mixture of tears and snot.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Jack gasps. “I was watching Carter —”

“It’s okay, everything’s okay,” Bittle says. “It was a wakeup call for all of us. We should probably look into getting her another round of swim lessons. Like the ones Carter had when he was her age.”

Jack nods helplessly.

“Should we do the slide one more time before we go home? I’ll sit with her if you want to go with Carter.”

But the moment is ruined, all the good feelings of the afternoon washed away. Bittle’s forgiveness and gentle tone do nothing to placate Jack, who is suddenly overcome with that same gnawing coil of nausea from earlier this morning. Who was he fooling, thinking he could take care of these kids?

“I’ll sit with her,” Jack insists, reluctant to let her go after their close call. “I’ll get her ready to go home.”

Bittle opens his mouth as if to protest, but seems to think better of it and just takes Carter’s hand in his. “One more trip down the slide. Let’s make this a good one.”

Jack wraps Birdy in a hooded panda bear towel he finds in Bittle’s backpack and simply holds her close to his racing heart. If he were alone he’d be fighting off a panic attack, but somehow, her solid weight against him grounds him, pulls him out of his own head.

They carry the kids the two blocks home in relative silence.

“I didn’t mean to yell, Sweetpea,” Bittle says quietly over the kids’ heads. “It just gave me such a scare.”

“It scared me, too. It was my fault. I need to be better.”

Bittle’s mouth twists into a little frown but he doesn’t say anything, just hitches Birdy a little higher on his hip and kisses the top of her head.

*

Jack would like to say his birthday improves after that, but that would be a lie.

It takes an hour to get the kids showered off and ready for dinner with Jack’s parents, and that doesn’t even include showers for the adults in the house. By the time everyone is ready they have just enough time to make it to the restaurant for their five-thirty reservation.

“Welcome back,” the hostess at the rustic farm-to-table restaurant greets them. “Mr. Zimmermann, your parents are already here. They’re at your usual table. The kids’ seats and menus are all set up.”

“Thank you, Molly,” Bittle says. “Would you mind storing this in the back until we’re ready for dessert?” He hands her the cake carrier he brought along. “Of course, there’s a slice with your name on it.”

“Well, how can I say no to that? Go on ahead; I’ll take care of this.”

Jack’s ability to keep a straight face comes in handy as they approach their table and his parents turn around. He’s expecting it, given the way the rest of his day has gone, but that doesn’t stop the sudden pang he feels when he realizes his parents are older, too. Maman’s hair has gone silver; Papa's wearing reading glasses to study his menu. They’re still a stunning couple, but he almost doesn't recognize them as the people he Skypes with each week. 

“It’s the birthday boy!” Papa greets him, patting the seat next to him as Bittle situates Birdy in the high chair and Carter scrambles into the booster seat set up next to Maman. “Did you enjoy your breakfast in bed?”

“It was good,” Jack says, honestly.

“Bitty said you had a few friends over last night. Must have been a real rager, if you couldn’t even remember where you were this morning.”

“Bob, we are responsible adults. I made appetizers and mini pies, and we opened that bottle of wine we got in Paris last summer. Everyone was home before midnight.”

Papa raises a suspicious eyebrow.

“Okay, fine,” Bittle clarifies. “Shitty got it in his head to make tub juice and he might have raided our liquor cabinet. I only had one cup. Maybe two.”

“That explains why this one was so out of it this morning,” Papa says, placing a hand on Jack’s shoulder.

Jack shrugs him off. “I can’t believe you can joke about this,” he says, because there’s nothing funny about drinking to excess. Not anymore, not since everything. “I almost died.”

Across the table, Carter’s eyes grow wide.

“Honey,” Bittle whispers, “maybe this isn’t the best time —”

“Of course,” Papa says. “It’s nothing to joke about. You just had me a little worried this morning.”

 _Me too_ , Jack thinks, scowling at his menu.

“Birdy almost died in the pool,” Carter pipes up.

“Carter, sweetie, that’s not true.”

“Did something happen at the pool?” Alicia asks, alarmed.

“This little one just gave us a scare, didn’t she?” Bittle pats Birdy’s head. “Thought she could just walk into the water.”

“Papa wasn’t watching her,” Carter supplies.

“Jack?” Papa raises an eyebrow.

“It was an accident,” Jack mumbles.

“We all learned we need to be a little more careful at the pool, didn’t we?” Bittle pulls a box of crayons out of the diaper bag and shakes them out onto the table. “But I don’t think this is a subject for the dinner table.” He hands each child a blank piece of paper.

“You know what?” Alicia says, handing a crayon to Carter. “I would love to hear about your trip to the zoo. Can you draw your favorite animal for me and Papa Bob?”

The kids color and chatter away about the zoo while Bittle shows off the pictures on his phone and Jack feels terrible.

Their waitress arrives to take their order, chatting with them like they’re all old friends. “Will the kids have lemonade?”

“Please?” Carter asks.

“Well, it is a special occasion,” Bittle says. “In the small cups, please,” he whispers to the waitress, who nods in understanding.

Jack orders the first random thing he sees on the menu, a grass-fed burger with crispy herbed potatoes and seasonal greens.

“What, no chicken tenders?” Papa asks in mock shock.

“Aw, he’ll eat Carter’s leftovers.” Bittle bumps Jack’s shoulder with his own. “Everybody be sure to save room for dessert, though; I brought cake.”

Their dinner arrives, but Jack doesn’t taste any of it. It feels like sawdust in his mouth and sits heavily in his stomach. As the conversation continues around him, he finds he can only focus on the abstract painting on the wall behind Maman and Carter. He focuses on two tiny points of red until they’re all he sees. He snaps back to reality at the sound of Bittle's voice.

“Are we ready for cake?”

“As long as you made it,” Papa says.

“Who do you take me for? It's a bit of a work in progress for the next book, but Jack liked the first trial run so much I decided to make it today.”

“Well, now I'm definitely ready,” Maman says, “if it has Jack's seal of approval.”

Papa chuckles. “You should think about using that as the title of the next book.” 

With his dinner still not sitting well, cake is the last thing Jack wants. “Are you sure we need cake?” he snaps. “We had muffins at breakfast.”

Bittle frowns. Maman’s eyebrows knit together in concern. It’s only when the warm pressure of his father’s hand settles on his own that he realizes he’s trembling.

“We don’t need to have cake,” Bittle says, affecting a cheerful tone Jack knows is anything but. It’s the same voice he uses to agree when Jack tells him they need to practice checking for 10 more minutes. “Let’s save it for later, then. Bob, Alicia, I’ll see if they can box up a few slices for y’all to take home with the kids.”

Jack wishes, more than anything, the ground would swallow him whole. Anything would be better than sitting around this table with these five faces — allegedly the most important people in his life — staring at him with various levels of concern. Even Birdy seems to know something isn’t right; she’s stopped humming and scribbling on the paper in front of her to quietly gaze at Jack with those blue eyes that are so like his own.

“I think that sounds like an excellent idea,” Alicia says, displaying her own formidable acting chops. “We can have a cake picnic out back, how does that sound?”

“Can Señor Bun come?”

“Of course he can!”

“Thank you, Alicia,” Bittle says.

“It’s no trouble, honey. We just want the two of you to enjoy the rest of your evening.”

“You can head over to the hotel early, get a head start on the weekend, eh?”

Bittle gives Papa a tight smile. “We’ll probably just turn in early so we can get an early start tomorrow.”

As they gather in the parking lot to transfer the kids’ things to his parents’ car, Jack is overcome, again, with the feeling that he’s ruined everything. He hugs his parents and the kids, because that’s what everyone expects from him, but all he feels is a hollow ache in his stomach. On top of everything, his knee is screaming at him.

“Happy birthday, honey,” Maman murmurs as they embrace. “We love you so much.”

“I love you, too,” Jack says around the lump in his throat.

“I think we should just go home,” Bittle says quietly as he puts the car in drive. His knuckles are white against the steering wheel.

“We don’t —”

“We do. You’re upset.”

“I’m —” Bittle isn’t wrong. “I don’t want to go home,” Jack finally says, because that much is true. Home isn’t home. The house he shares with Bittle is filled with reminders of a life he’ll never remember, a life he didn’t earn.

Bittle doesn’t reply for a long while. Finally, he rests his hand on Jack’s leg and gives it a little squeeze. “It’s been a long day. A night in our own bed’ll do us both some good. I’ll call the hotel and ask if we can check in tomorrow.”

They don’t speak when they get home. Bittle heads to the kitchen. Jack goes upstairs and changes into an old Bruins t-shirt and a pair of athletic shorts he finds in the dresser. There’s an iPad on his nightstand; he takes it back downstairs with him.

Bittle’s busy mixing something in a bowl when Jack finds him in the kitchen. “I need to ice my knee,” he says. His voice sounds small and pitiful to his own ears.

“Oh, I’ve got you, you big moose,” Bittle says, already pulling an ice pack from the freezer. “I forget how bad you’re hurting right now,” he says, pressing the ice pack into Jack’s hand. “Not an excuse for the way you’ve been acting today, Monsieur Grumpy, but I could do with being a little more understanding myself. Why don’t you go rest on the couch? I’ll bring you some tea when I get this crumble in the oven.”

“Thanks,” Jack manages. He searches Bittle’s face for any indication he suspects he isn’t the husband he thinks he is, but all he sees is love. Love and a smudge of flour on his cheek. He resists the urge to run his thumb over it and wipe it away.

Once he’s settled on the couch, he pulls out his phone. There must be something on here — a calendar, notes, a fitness app — that will give him some idea of how to play this role he’s found himself in.

He settles on Instagram.

His account is dominated by photos of Bittle and the kids, interspersed with scenic shots of buildings and landscapes. The most recent photo, in fact, is of Bittle seated at a small table with a coffee mug in front of him. “Quick coffee date while the kids are with their godparents,” is Jack’s caption. A few pictures later, “the kids” make an appearance of their own, each holding a small American flag in one hand and a popsicle in the other. There’s the Eiffel Tower at night. Bittle and the kids wearing mouse ears at Disney World. Carter in hockey skates. Jack stops scrolling when his eyes catch on a photo of himself and Bittle laughing and cutting what must be their wedding cake. They’re older than their Samwell selves, but younger than they are now. “Happy anniversary to my best friend,” he’d written.

The kids get smaller as Jack continues to scroll. There’s Birdy, sitting in a high chair and pursing her lips as somebody out of camera holds a spoon toward her. Carter standing on the front porch on the first day of preschool. Jack, Bittle, and Carter all grinning from ear to ear and holding a sign that says: "June 2032." Carter’s wearing a shirt that says “Big Brother.”

The photos don’t lie: Jack loves his life. He loves his family. He has no idea how he got here or how to get back to where he belongs. So the decision is easy. He’ll continue to be the husband, father, son everyone expects him to be, for as long as he needs to be.

Next, he opens the iPad and does a quick search on his name. The number of articles and photos is overwhelming; he chooses a YouTube channel run by somebody who uses the online alias Zimmerfann1.

By the time Bittle settles down next to him and hands him a cup of tea, Jack has watched his career unfurl in the span of 30 minutes.

The channel is a treasure trove of his greatest hits, from signing with the Falconers right up through his retirement. It even includes footage from Bittle’s cooking show. He might find this obsessive chronicle of his life and career a little creepy, if he weren’t so desperate to account for 20 missing years. Instead, he’s thankful somebody out there thought to save and upload all of this footage.

There’s his first season, with the Falconers, where he established himself as a leader early on and received the A midway through the season for his efforts. At the end of that remarkable rookie year, the Cup — and the moment Zimmerfann1 captioned “The kiss that broke the ice.”

He kissed Bittle. He kissed Bittle on the ice, in front of everyone, and cameras caught it from every angle. In the press conference he looks overwhelmed and exhausted, but he’s straightforward when asked about Bittle, referring to him as “my boyfriend.”

He delves deeper into the archives, studying himself the way he might study an opponent for clues about his on-ice performance. In the earlier footage he’s sharp and quick on his feet, scoring often. There’s another Cup celebration. Eventually he trades his Falconers blue and yellow for the Bruins’ yellow and black. As a Bruin he’s still sharp, he still scores, but he’s more cautious. Slower. His teammates get younger each year as he grows into the elder statesman of the team. It’s inevitable, really. He’s seen it happen with his father’s friends. It’s just surreal to watch himself go through that evolution in a matter of minutes.

Bittle hooks his chin over Jack’s shoulder and simply watches the last few years go by, culminating in one final Cup win and its aftermath, which sees Bittle joining him on the ice in a reprise of their coming out kiss. This time, Jack’s holding a small Carter on his hip.

There’s press conference footage, a reporter asking Jack if he has any regrets about retiring. “You just won the Stanley Cup. Don’t tell me you’re not having second thoughts.”

“I had 15 good years in the league,” the Jack of three years ago says. “To go out on top is more than most guys get. I’m going to focus on my family and go back to school.”

Jack folds the cover over the screen and sets the iPad to the side. He had a good career. It’s everything he’s always wanted, and was so sure he’d lost.

“Honey, are you sure everything is okay?” Bittle’s tone is light but his eyes are sad. “You haven’t been yourself all day, and now this trip down memory lane.” His eyes narrow. “This isn’t some sort of midlife crisis thing, is it? You aren’t gonna frost your tips and buy a Aeroflux?

“God, I hope not,” Jack says, referring to the midlife crisis and not … whatever it is that Bittle’s fearful he might do.

“Or leave me for a hot, young blond?” Bittle wiggles closer.

“You are a hot, young blond.” That’s 100-percent Jack Zimmermann, no acting required.

“Younger than you,” Bittle snorts. “Maybe not so hot anymore.”

“Definitely still hot.” Has Bittle not seen himself?

“The same goes for you, mister.” Bittle sighs happily. “Lord, you’re as handsome as the day I met you. More, because you don’t look at me with those angry eyes anymore.”

“I really could have done better at first, eh?” All of the terrible things Jack has said to Bittle, beginning with “eat more protein” and ending with “it was a lucky shot,” are singed into his memory. He wishes he could take it all back.

“You know that’s all in the past. We learned how to be better together.”

Bittle deserves better than the person Jack was in the past, he thinks. He’ll learn to be better. He’ll start with the thing he’s knows will make him happiest right now. “Are you hungry?” he asks. “I think I’m ready for that piece of cake.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Carter's "train movie" is based on a [real movie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bc9OSu_UBQ) my kids were obsessed with when they were younger.


	4. Chapter 4

In the wake of all this sudden and inexplicable change, Jack’s habit of getting up early has stuck. It’s still dark outside when he wakes next to Bittle. He’s disappointed, but not surprised.

Quietly, so as not to disturb Bittle, he slides out of bed and heads downstairs, taking his phone with him. A reminder pops up on the screen when he picks it up: _Pick_ _up_ _suit_ , _10_ _a_. _m_. He’ll have to find a way to ask Bittle about that.

  
The Haus kitchen is barely functional; certainly none of its inhabitants knew the oven was calibrated incorrectly before Bittle joined the team and commandeered it for his baking projects. Their plates and cookware are a hodgepodge of secondhand items brought from home, cheap gadgets purchased at the Murder Stop & Shop, and repurposed takeout containers. In the entire time he’s lived there, nobody has bothered to clean the sticky mystery substance coating the bottom of the vegetable drawer in the fridge. There are Sriracha stains on the floor and, bizarrely, the ceiling. It’s gross but it’s home.

  
So is his parents’ state-of-the-art kitchen, which was designed with entertaining and photo shoots in mind. Papa took an interest in using the kitchen after the remodel, and has taken a few classes, but even he doesn’t know how everything works. It remains photo shoot-ready thanks to twice-weekly visits by the housekeeper.

  
The Bittle-Zimmermann kitchen is a happy medium. Everything in it is expensive, but there’s no question everything has a purpose. Bittle’s red stand mixer shows signs of frequent use. The tiny fingerprints on the cabinets and the bottom of the refrigerator, and the kitchen playset in the corner, are proof the family spends a lot of time in here together.

  
The copper pots and heavy red cookware are nice, and almost certainly Bittle’s doing, but this morning Jack is most thankful for the coffee maker on the counter. He’s even more thankful when it turns out to operate with the single press of a button. He pours it into a Samwell Alumni Association mug he finds hanging in a cabinet.

  
Jack grabs a leftover muffin from a basket on the counter and takes it and the coffee to the kitchen table, where his anxiety brain drowns out any other thoughts he might have. He’s done a good job of faking it with the kids, and even his parents, but he’s at a loss when it comes to Bittle. Sooner or later, Bittle’s going to start to grow suspicious as to why the man he married is acting like a stranger. He needs to learn what makes Bittle tick. But he can’t exactly go up to him and ask him what he likes, as if they’re on a first date. Jack is going to have to do this a little more stealthily. He’s not sure when Bittle will be up, but he’ll use every minute until then to attempt to figure this out.

  
He opens the notes app on his phone. He begins with the things he knows about Bittle:

  * Likes to bake
  * From Georgia
  * Afraid of checks
  * Former figure skater
  * Likes pop music (Beyoncé?)
  * Is a good dad
  * ?



It’s not a lot to go on. But maybe there are more clues right under his nose. Bittle’s social media?

  
The personal, friends-only Instagram account Jack finds is a down-to-earth mix of personal photos and plugs for Bittle’s projects. Each photo is accompanied by a story or recipe, told in Bittle’s unmistakable voice. It’s here that Jack learns Birdy’s favorite food is strawberries, and that Carter wants to be a train conductor when he grows up. It’s here he learns that Bittle’s connection to the NHL has resulted in a long-term contract catering events associated with the All-Star game. And, it’s here he learns that Bittle has intentions of running 4 miles every morning because “getting older isn’t getting easier,” but his resolve falls apart in the winter because “my bed and my husband’s arms are warm, and man was just not meant to be outside when there’s a minus in front of the temperature.”

  
Jack smiles in spite of himself. He finds himself digging deeper into the archives, curious about the charming family they appear to be online.

  
It’s not all charming. There are stories about tantrums and delayed flights. Three separate posts are devoted to the saga of a burst pipe. There’s a sweet photo of Carter, all suited up in hockey gear, sitting on the ice while five other toddlers are lined up next to their coach. “This one couldn’t stop talking about his first official hockey practice, and now we’re here and he won’t participate. Threenagers, am I right?”

  
There’s a selfie of Bittle, unshaven and bleary-eyed, apparently taken when Birdy was an infant: “Coffee, please! Jack and Carter have the flu, and the little one still isn’t sleeping through the night. Just keeping it real here, y’all. My life isn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t change a thing.”

  
Jack likes that Bittle shares the parts of their home life that others might sweep under the rug. As much as his parents tried to shield him from the media’s scrutiny when he was younger, the pressure to be perfect for the cameras was always there. After his overdose, his mother’s publicist suggested they sweep it under the rug, spin Jack’s decision to drop out of the draft as a personal choice even as tabloids were reporting gross exaggerations of the truth. In the end, his parents had granted one interview to a reporter they trusted, but even then the image presented was one of a model family bravely weathering an unexpected storm.

  
He feels some relief that their kids aren’t being held to such impossible standards, that the version of their family that the public sees is as messy and complicated as any other family.

  
When he’s seen enough pictures, he swipes over to his text messages and scrolls through his contacts until he lands on “Bits.”

  
Reading their ongoing conversation, Jack has the unsettled feeling that he’s intruding on something private, even though it’s his conversation. Most of their messages are short and to-the-point, questions about schedules or reminders to pick something up at the store. As the kids’ primary caregiver, Jack sends a lot of pictures to Bittle while he’s at work.

There’s a longer conversation a month or so back that’s surprisingly relevant:

Bits: That reception with the mayor is only 6 weeks away. You should probably make an appointment with Andrew to have a new suit made.  
Jack: I have suits.  
Bits: Please tell me you’re joking.  
Bits: Jack?  
Jack: Birdy was trying to eat dog food. What’s wrong with my suits?  
Bits: Those are all from before Carter was born, back when you were still playing. The cut on those is all wrong. Fashion evolves, Jack!  
Jack: It’s just a dinner.  
Bits: A dinner where you have to give a speech. Trust me, you need a new suit. Ask your mama, she’ll agree with me.  
Jack: I’ll make an appointment.  
Bits: Can you also pick up some butter at the store today?  
Jack: Unsalted?  
Bits: Of course.  
Jack: Yes.

The wood floor creaks, startling Jack. He looks up to see a sleep-rumpled Bittle padding across the floor in shorts and a red t-shirt emblazoned with “Disneyland Gay Days” and a picture of Sleeping Beauty’s castle. In the morning, soft and sleepy like this, he reminds Jack of the frog he knows back at Samwell, never quite awake when Jack drags him to early morning checking practice.

  
“G’morning, sweetheart.”

  
Jack quickly closes the notes app on his phone. “Good morning. I made coffee.”

  
Bittle’s already pulling a mug from the cabinet and filling it. “What’s got you so busy this morning?” he asks, looking over Jack’s shoulder.

  
“Euh …” He can’t very well tell Bittle he’s been _researching_ their relationship. “Just looking at my calendar. I have to pick up my suit today.”

  
“I was gonna suggest we leave early and get breakfast on the way, but it looks like you got a head start.”

  
“Sorry. We can do lunch afterward.”

  
“We can,” Bittle agrees, “but we should probably get on the road sooner rather than later. Why don’t you shower while I run Daisy for a few? That way your parents won’t have to walk her when they come over to pick her up.”

  
Jack looks over at their black lab, snoozing on a pillow in the corner. Neither dog nor husband looks ready to run. “All right.”

  
“I’ll change real quick.”

  
When Bittle comes back downstairs, he’s considerably more chipper and less clothed, wearing running shorts and a thin tank top. “Ready to run, Daisy Girl?” he calls as he pulls a leash from a hook near the door. The dog immediately perks up and runs to Bittle’s side. “You know I’m counting on you to start doing this again once that knee of yours is healed,” Bittle says with a grin. “I miss running together.”

  
“You miss chirping me because you’re faster than I am,” Jack replies automatically. It’s a reflex action based on all the times Bittle’s chirped him about being faster on the ice during checking practice, but it feels true.

  
“Well, that too. Daisy’s getting old; I think she likes that you’re more her pace.”

  
“Bittle.”

  
“Okay, we’re goin’! Don’t use all the hot water!” Bittle calls as he and the dog leave. Jack follows them out and watches them from the porch, coffee in hand, as they sprint down the quiet street.

*

  
The hotel they booked for their weekend in Boston had been more than accommodating when Bittle called last night to change their reservation. Jack is still a bit of a local celebrity and Bittle, in addition to being a popular TV personality, helped overhaul the hotel’s restaurant and café menus a few years back. Everyone from the valet to the woman who checks them in greets them like they’re old friends. “Happy birthday, Mr. Zimmermann,” she says with a wink as she hands them each a key card. “Enjoy your stay with us.”

  
“Oh, I’m sure he will,” Bittle says. “His actual birthday was yesterday, but I have a few kid-free surprises planned for this weekend.” He turns toward Jack. “Should we head over to Andrew’s?”

  
Jack shrugs. Trying clothes on has never been his favorite.

  
“It’ll go fast,” Bittle says, apparently reading his mind. He slips a hand into Jack’s as they walk out of the lobby. “I know walking around isn’t much your speed these days, so I got tickets to that IMAX movie about the Mars expedition. It starts at 3:30.” He continues to chatter away for the duration of their short walk.

  
A receptionist looks up from her phone when they arrive at the small shop. “Andrew’s in the back waiting for you,” she says in monotone before returning her attention to her phone.

  
Andrew, a tall bespectacled man around Jack’s age, greets Jack and Bittle like old friends “You know the drill,” he tells Jack, leading him to a fitting room where the suit is already hanging on the door. “Get this on and we’ll see if I need to make any final adjustments.” He leaves Jack alone in the vestibule while he and Bittle wait just outside. Jack can hear them making conversation about kids and work and the unseasonably warm summer.

  
When he steps out, Bittle actually gasps. “Oh, _honey_ ,” he breathes.

  
Jack huffs out a laugh in spite of himself.

  
“I clean up nice, eh, Bittle?”

  
“I just don’t get to see you all dressed up like this very often anymore, now that you’re retired,” Bittle says, blushing a bit.

  
Andrew walks around him, smoothing out his coat and inspecting the hems on his pants. “This should be perfect, as long as you wear the shoes you brought for the first fitting. Does everything feel okay?”

  
Jack shrugs his shoulders once or twice so the jacket can settle naturally. He’ll always be most comfortable in athletic pants and a t-shirt, but he’s spent his life dressing for events. This is part of being Jack Zimmermann.

  
“Euh, yeah,” he says, still focused on Bittle. He stands up a little straighter.

  
“Give me a spin, I want to put this on my Instastory,” Bittle says, pulling out his phone.

  
Jack doesn’t know what that means but complies anyway, turning slowly as Bittle captures him from all angles.

  
“This is a nice update for you,” Andrew says. “The jacket is a little more contemporary than your others, but we can always have another made if it falls out of style.”

  
Jack nods.

  
“Should I package it up for you?”

  
“Can you give us a minute, Andrew?” Bittle asks, coming to stand beside Jack.

  
“As long as you don’t defile my fitting room,” Andrew replies with a smirk.

 

“That’s why we chose a hotel just a few blocks away,” Bittle quips.

  
Andrew’s laughter reverberates throughout the small room. “I’ll go write up your bill, gentlemen.”

  
Jack makes a move to head back toward the changing room, but Bittle stops him with a gentle hand to the waist. He pulls Jack a little closer and the look in his eyes ... he looks like he wants to devour Jack.

  
“I mean it. You look so, _so_ good. I told you getting a new suit was a good idea.” He reaches up to adjust Jack’s tie. “Perfect.”

  
And, okay, the attention is nice. It’s been a long time since somebody has talked to Jack like this, and he hasn’t felt that great about himself since waking up yesterday and realizing his best days are far behind him. If Bittle — his husband — wants to pay him compliments and look at him like he still belongs on _The_ _Swallow’s_ “50 Most Beautiful” list, Jack isn’t going to stop him.

  
“Andrew’s right. We should probably get out of here, because the things I want to do to you ...” Bittle doesn’t finish that thought, but his saucy smirk is a clue as to what he might have in mind.

  
“I’ll go ahead and change.”

  
In the end, Bittle has to wait to do the things he implied he might want to do. After paying for the suit and making arrangements to have a courier drop it off at the hotel, Bittle informs Jack they have just enough time before lunch and the movie to check out the new exhibit at the Institute of Contemporary Art, where they apparently have a membership.

  
They end their day in the hotel’s bistro, sharing a bottle of wine and a charcuterie platter in a private corner. Despite his earlier worries, Jack’s become more comfortable with Bittle as the day has progressed. This shouldn’t surprise him, but it does. He had fun yesterday with the kids, when he wasn’t letting his anxiety get the better of him. He’d thought being alone with Bittle might be more difficult — he _still_ isn’t sure what they talk about — but he’s surprised when it feels comfortable and easy. He doesn’t know Bittle, not really, but Bittle knows him, and he thoughtfully planned their getaway with Jack in mind.

  
Bittle is attentive and kind, and surprisingly funny. He’s obviously used to leading the conversation, because he barely breathes as he flits from topic to topic. His review of the IMAX movie segues into a discussion on potty training Birdy, which turns into a rant about his mother’s Christmas plans. “Goodness knows why she needs to know our plans now; I told her we need to get through your surgery and filming the next half season before I even _think_ about the holidays. It is _August_ , woman!”

  
Jack can’t help but be amused by Bittle’s ire. “So, potty training …”

  
“That girl,” Bittle says, shaking his head, and he’s off again.

  
Jack can count on one hand the number of close friends he’s had in his lifetime. There’s Shitty, obviously, and Lardo. Ransom and Holster he’d put in that category, probably. And Kent … well, he can’t exclude Kent, even if things did end the way they did. The point is, Jack’s always had a hard time allowing himself to be close to people. He doesn’t know how or why it happened with Bittle, but he understands, now, how easy it must have been to let himself fall once Bittle broke through that friendship barrier.

  
“I’m tired,” Bittle says, as they let themselves into their suite. He collapses onto the couch, pulling Jack down with him. “This feels so … decadent. A room to ourselves, no kids.” He looks meaningfully at the bed. “But first,” he says, pulling out his phone, “we should probably say goodnight to them.”

  
Within a minute, Maman and the kids are smiling at them via FaceTime. “We just had baths and are getting ready for stories,” she says. “How was your evening?”

  
“We got to pick _two_ stories!” Carter interrupts. “Papa Bob took us to the bookstore and I got a train book. Birdy got a dog book.”

  
Birdy holds her book in front of her face. “Dogs!”

  
Bittle laughs. “Those look so nice. I can’t wait to read them with you when Papa and I get home.”

  
“Papa, did you like the museum and the movie?”

  
“It was good, bud.”

  
Carter claps his hands delightedly. “Daddy said it was a surprise. I kept the secret.”

  
“You did a good job,” Jack says.

  
“You sure did, sweetheart,” Bittle says. “Did you have a good day?”

  
“Books!” Birdy waves her board book in the air, almost clipping Maman on the chin.

  
“Uh oh,” Maman says, eyes darting toward something out of view. “I think I hear the monster.”

  
In her lap, both kids giggle.

  
“Whoooo!” Papa sounds more like an owl than any monster Jack’s ever heard of, but it’s enough to get both kids shrieking with laughter. He swoops into the frame, wearing two winter toques on his head and a crocheted blanket like a cape around his shoulders. “I’m going to get you!” he roars.

  
More shrieking, and Maman’s laughter. “Stop it, Bobby, you’re getting them all wound up before bed.”

  
“Chase us!” Carter yells. “Did you know that Papa Bob can run faster than you, Papa?”

  
Everyone laughs at that, even Jack.

  
“Oh, Jack. What did we ever do before these two came along?” Papa asks.

  
“We hounded them about grandkids,” Maman says. “Boys, I think I have to get these three settled down before bed, but as you can see, everything is great here. We brought Daisy back with us and took her with us when we went to get ice cream after dinner. Are you still planning to be back on Sunday morning?”

  
“We’re staying one more night and heading home Sunday morning,” Bittle confirms.

  
“Oh!” Carter bounces up and down. “Can we play with my trains on Sunday? All of us? I want to have a birthday party for the trains like we had for Papa.”

  
Bittle laughs and even Jack can’t stop himself from smiling. “We can have a party for the trains.”

  
“With tacos?”

  
“We’ll see. Good night, you two. I love you.”

  
“Good night, Daddy. Good night, Papa. I love you.”

  
“Love you,” Birdy says.

  
“Love you,” Jack echoes.

  
Both kids beam and Jack is stuck, again, at how they’re perfect, miniature versions of themselves. He stares at the phone long after Bittle ends the call and their faces fade from view.

  
Bittle lets out an amused little sigh after he ends the call. “I’m not sure who’s the bigger kid, your dad or the kids.”

  
“My dad.”

  
“Probably. Wanna watch something before bed?” Bittle asks, turning on the flat screen and selecting an option from the movie menu.

  
“I never thought I’d have to go to a hotel just to watch a Star Wars movie,” Jack says as the opening credits of the most recent movie in the franchise ( _crisse_ , how many has he missed?) begin to roll.

  
“Lie down,” Bittle says, adjusting so Jack’s head rests in his lap.

  
“I might fall asleep.”

  
“Mm. Just relax.” As Bittle plays with his hair, the sounds of lightsabers and TIE fighters lull Jack to sleep. He wakes near the end of the final battle. “What’d I miss?”

  
“I don’t know!” Bittle says, laughing. “I fell asleep, too. This trilogy is the worst. I guess now we can at least say we finally watched it.”

  
“Ah, well. Not everything is as exciting as Carter’s train movie.”

  
Bittle snorts. “You have the patience of a saint, sitting though that as many times as you have. Though, I guess I trained you well with _Lemonade_ , didn’t I?”

  
“I like it,” Jack insists. “We should do that train trip next summer.”

  
Bittle shifts a little and frowns down at Jack. “I thought you wanted to do it in the winter, for Carter’s birthday.”

  
Well, shit. How could Jack have known he’s already suggested this?

  
“I just … I guess I forgot.”

  
“Sweetheart, is everything _really_ okay?”

  
And the thing is, Jack could easily come clean and tell Bittle everything. As crazy as it sounds, there’s a big part of him that thinks Bittle would believe him. But he pushes that desire down because there’s another part that knows what it means for an athlete like him to suddenly develop memory lapses in middle age. It would only worry Bittle, and his parents, if he were to hint at that. Even if Jack is absolutely certain it’s _not_ the cause of all of this.

  
“I’m fine,” Jack finally says. “I’ve just been feeling a little anxious about things.”

  
“You have to give that speech in a few weeks.”

  
“That,” Jack says, “and the surgery.”

  
“You know it’s a routine surgery,” Bittle murmurs. “Your doctor has done that surgery hundreds of times. And you’ll feel so good when it’s over with. You’ll be able to run again, and get on the ice with me and Carter. He’s been talking about skating with you for months, now.”

  
“I know,” Jack says, feeling somewhat heartened to know Carter wants to skate with him. “I’ve just never liked hospitals. Not since …”

  
“I know,” Bittle says, and that’s all he needs to say.

  
They’re silent through the last few minutes of the movie, which ends with the Empire claiming victory.

  
“Wanna move to the bed?” Bittle asks as the credits roll.

  
“Maybe not just yet,” Jack says. “I like the way this feels.”

  
Bittle hums in agreement.

  
“You know what I really want for my birthday?” Jack asks sleepily.

  
“What’s that?”

  
“Will you tell me the story of how we fell in love?”

  
True to Jack’s prediction, Bittle positively melts. “I thought by now you’d be tired of that story,” he says, leaning down to press a gentle kiss to Jack’s forehead.

  
“Never.”

  
“Well, then—” he begins to play with Jack’s hair again. “I guess all it took was getting you in my kitchen. That’s how it started for me, anyway, when we were baking for that Women, Food, and American Culture class —”

  
“Neither of us is a woman and I’m not American.”

  
“Hush, are you tellin’ this story or am I? Anyway, we were baking and chirping each other and chirping’s really just flirting, isn’t it? Except, I thought you were straight —”

  
“I was never straight.” Of that much, Jack is certain.

  
“Well, I know that now,” Bittle scoffs. “But back then, I suffered alone with my horrible, embarrassing crush and you had no idea what all that flirting was doing to my poor heart because you had no idea you were flirting. Every time you took me to coffee or bought me frozen yogurt, I thought you were just being nice.”

  
“Those … sound like dates to me.”

  
“You’re trying to rewrite history, honey. They were dates, of course, but we were both so oblivious. You were still a big hockey robot who couldn’t talk about feelings, let alone admit there might be something you liked as much as hockey. What was it you said? I make you feel the same way hockey makes you feel? Yeah, even then you couldn’t talk about being in love in any other terms. Um, where was I?”

  
“Coffee and frozen yogurt?”

  
“Right! And of course, there was hockey. Once they moved me back up to your line we were kind of unstoppable. Somewhere between baking and hockey, I guess we fell in love. And somewhere between Fourth of July at my parents’ house and y’all winning the Cup, we both kind of knew it was forever.”

  
Bittle makes it sound so easy, and maybe it was that easy. Is it really important that Jack account for every missing minute, if he’s happy now? If none of this had happened, if Jack had lived every day of the past 20 years, would he still be happy? He thinks he probably would be.

  
“Falling in love with you is the best thing that ever happened to me,” Jack says. On some level, he knows it’s true.

  
Bittle shifts a little until he’s lying next to Jack, forehead to forehead. There’s a split second where Jack hesitates, but then he goes with the choice that feels good. Bittle tastes sweet, the way Jack expected him to taste.

  
“Oh my lord,” Bittle says when they pull apart. “That was … definitely not the way you kiss me in front of the kids.”

  
“Has it been that long?” Jack asks, suddenly worried that maybe they don’t do this anymore.

  
Bittle furrows his brow. “Well, how long ago was our anniversary trip? Kind of hard to take our time like this when one or both kids end up in our bed most nights.”

  
“The kids aren’t here,” Jack points out.

  
Bittle’s cheeks flush a deep pink, which Jack finds charming and a bit gratifying. He’s always figured his parents, who frequently hint at their still-active sex life and genuinely refer to each other as best friends, are an anomaly. Most couples aren’t actually as crazy about each other after this many years as his parents are. Maybe he and Bittle got a little bit of their luck.

  
“Let’s finish this conversation in bed. I’m too old to be doing this on the couch.”

  
Jack snorts, and allows Bittle to pull him toward the bed. This day may have started with acting, but every part of him wants this now. In the end, he isn’t sure where the pretending ends and his real life begins.

 


	5. Chapter 5

Waking up next to Bittle is expected now. The thing that’s different this morning is that Jack is spooned around Bittle, and he doesn’t mind.

They didn’t do much more than kiss last night. In the end, they really had been exhausted and Bittle, with whatever sixth sense he seems to possess when it comes to the way Jack’s mind works, had gently put the brakes on things when he realized Jack was a little hesitant to move beyond kissing. They had cuddled instead, the steady rhythm of Bittle’s breathing eventually lulling Jack to sleep.

He wants to do more, he’d realized sometime between kissing Bittle for the first time and falling asleep wrapped up in each other. He just isn’t sure how to get there without completely blowing his cover. He’s done a good job of faking his way through this marriage, but he’s not sure he can fake his way through actual sex with the one person who may know him better than he knows himself.

“Mmm,” Bittle hums, twisting in Jack’s embrace so they’re face-to-face. “It’s early.”

“I wake up early.”

“The kids aren’t here and you can’t run. Go back to sleep for an hour.” Bittle closes his eyes, apparently having made the decision for both of them. 

Jack does not go back to sleep. Awake and alone with his thoughts, all he can think about is that he needs to come clean with Bittle, sooner rather than later. He can’t keep living as though this is a temporary condition, when there’s really no precedent for what has happened. He might never get back to his own time. The mistakes he’s made haven’t been catastrophic, but they were enough to raise eyebrows. Eventually, he’s going to stumble again, and he might not be able to brush it off as stress or nerves. Worse, somebody may actually get hurt.

If he does tell Bittle, it probably won’t be as bad as he’s been imagining. Bittle loves him. Bittle won’t think he’s crazy. If he does, he’ll help him fix this.

By the time Bittle stirs again, the sun is peeking through the curtains and Jack has made a decision. He lets Bittle stretch and sigh for a bit, aware he may be about to blow everything up but hopeful he won't.

“Should I order breakfast?” Bittle asks, sitting up and reaching for the room service menu on the nightstand. His cowlick is sticking out at at a half-dozen different angles, and Jack has to resist the urge to pat it down. “Last time we were here we had those good omelets —”

“Wait.” 

At Jack’s touch, Bittle stops and turns toward him. “Not hungry?” He grins. “Or are you feeling hungry for something else?”

“Bittle, I need to talk to you.”

Bittle’s face falls and Jack’s stomach drops as he belatedly realizes what that sounds like. “It’s not … whatever you’re thinking, I promise it’s not that.” 

“What is it, honey?” Bittle’s voice is barely more than a whisper and shit, Jack is already screwing this up.

“This is probably going to sound crazy,” he begins, raking a hand through his hair, “but do you remember when I woke up the other day and you thought I wasn’t quite acting like myself? That’s because I wasn’t … quite … myself.”

“What’re you saying?”  

Jack closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, exhales for seven beats. Bittle doesn’t rush him, just patiently waits while Jack corrals his thoughts. “Two nights ago, I was a junior at Samwell. I went to bed after a game and when I woke up I was in bed with you.” 

“Well, shoot, honey. Here I thought you were trying to tell me you’re having an affair. If it’s just that —” Bittle rolls his eyes. “Jack, will you just tell me what’s going on? I know something’s bothering you, and I don’t know if it’s me or the kids or some midlife crisis thing, but I’m starting to get worried.”

There’s an opening there. “It’s really not any of that,” he says quickly, hoping to alleviate at least some of Bittle’s fears. “That’s what I’m trying to say. Bittle, I know it sounds ridiculous but I need you to trust me. I’m twenty-three. I went to bed in my bed at the Haus in 2013 and I woke up in bed with you on my forty-fourth birthday. I have no memory of anything that happened in between. I have no idea how or why this happened, or if I’m ever going to go back to normal.”

Bittle narrows his eyes. “Jack Zimmermann, stop messing around with me.”

“I’m not. I know it doesn’t make sense, but I promise I’m not making this up. I thought it would fix itself, but it hasn’t yet. I’m still here and —” he needs to proceed carefully here, because Bittle’s face is doing a _thing_ Jack recognizes from all the times he’s surprised him with a check, like he wants to cry but is trying to be brave — “I’m learning to like it here, but it’s not my life.”

Bittle abruptly pulls away from Jack, taking his body heat with him. “You need to think very carefully about what you just told me, because it sounds like you just told me you time traveled here from 2013.”

Jack nods. 

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

“It was, um … We just played Yale. You scored. My dad was impressed. I told you it was a lucky shot.”

Bittle’s eyes are still wide. “Okay, um, so you don’t like me —”

“— I think we turned out okay —”

“— yet. You don’t like me yet. That’s okay. Okay. Okay.” Bittle keeps nodding and repeating the word like a mantra. “Okay.” Suddenly, his eyes grow wide and he forcefully shoves Jack away. Jack throws a hand out behind him to keep from rolling clear off the bed. Bittle is strong. “Oh my lord, I’ve been sleeping with a stranger!” Bittle’s face, now buried in his hands, has gone a deep crimson.

“Not … a stranger,” Jack protests, his heart constricting. “I’m still me. Just … a different me. And technically, all we’ve really done is sleep. We haven’t —”

“Oh my _god_ ,” Bittle groans. “If you’re 23-year-old Jack in my Jack’s body, where is _my_ Jack? Is he running around Samwell twenty years ago, messing everything up?” He looks fairly distressed at the thought. 

That’s a good question. Jack hasn’t really considered the logistics of whatever’s happened to him. He’d assumed it was just some variation on time travel and that he’d quantum leaped into his future body, but maybe there was some sort of reversal? Is there some older version of himself out there, enjoying his 23-year-old body and trying not to flirt with Bittle? That might not be a bad thing, he thinks, considering the way he nearly fucks things up with Bittle on a daily basis. Maybe his older, married self would be less of a dick to Bittle than he is.

“I don’t think it works that way.”

“How do you know how it works?” Bittle presses his palms to his eyes, as if by doing so he can make Jack and all of these new complications he’s brought into his life disappear. “These past few days I’ve just known something is wrong, and I was trying to tell myself it wasn’t as bad as I thought and I suppose it’s not, but  —”

“You thought it was bad?”

Bittle slowly peeks out from behind his hands. “I knew you weren’t having an affair, or running a secret meth empire, but taking your eyes off Birdy at the pool isn’t like you at all.”

“I feel terrible about the pool.” Just thinking about it, now, makes him feel sick.

“I know you do. It could’ve happened to anyone, but knowing now that you’re not quite yourself … it makes sense.”

“So you believe me?” 

“Oh, honey.” Bittle’s smaller than Jack, but that doesn’t stop him from creeping toward him and gently easing him down until they’re spooned together. Bittle wraps his arms around him and hooks his chin over Jack’s shoulder. “I believe you.”

“You do? Why?” Despite his certainty that this is happening to him, Jack isn’t sure he’d be quite so quick to believe it if it were somebody else’s story.

“Because you’ve never lied to me,” he says into Jack’s neck. “Not once, not even when we didn’t like each other. You told me some harsh truths, but you never lied. And because —” Bittle pauses. In their quiet room, Jack can hear his measured breathing and the steadying beat of his heart.

“Because —”

“Because something happened once that I’ve always questioned. It was after … Well, I guess you don’t remember because it wouldn’t have happened to you yet, but it wasn’t long after that Yale game, actually. Your dad wanted to take me and Mama to breakfast, and he sent you to come get me. On the walk over we ran into Johnson and he said some things that always made me wonder.”

“Johnson is weird.”

“It was weirder than usual. We actually talked about it a few years ago, not that you’d remember. He was talking about timelines and said something about it being a great story for our kids. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, because we were still barely friends, but looking back it was like he knew. Our _kids_ , Jack. And he said other things, too. I was thinking of quitting the team and going home with Mama that afternoon, and he told me I was where I needed to be. I hadn’t told anybody I was thinking of quitting.”

“Maybe,” Jack says slowly, now reassessing every weird and seemingly random thing Johnson had ever told him. He’d always dismissed his observations as weird goalie things, but maybe there’s more to it. 

“This is so weird,” Bittle says, tugging Jack toward him so they’re once again facing each other. “You look like you.” He gently runs his thumb along the faint scar on Jack’s chin that was definitely not there a few days ago. “But you don’t remember … Of course you don’t. And you and I aren’t —”

“I think you’re a little afraid of me,” Jack admits. “I haven’t been very nice to you.”

“It took a little while for both of us.” Bittle pauses. “Oh my lord, is that why you asked me how we fell in love?” He gently thwacks Jack’s chest. “You are so ridiculous! Here I thought you were trying to be romantic.”

“I was,” Jack surprises himself by saying. “I wanted to know about us. Now that I know we’re … It was never about you, Bittle. I have a way of making things difficult for myself. ”

“Yes, you did, mister. But we got here in our own time. Well, your time is still …” Bittle shrugs. “Jack, I believe you, but I don’t _understand_ it.”

“Neither do I. What if I’m stuck here? Not that … not that it would be a bad thing,” Jack clarifies. “I … I like us.” He can feel his face grow warm with the admission.

“So when you woke up next to me on your birthday you weren’t entirely repulsed?” Bittle still has a slightly wary look in his eyes, like he might bolt at any minute. Jack is somewhat comforted by the knowledge that in just the shorts he wore to bed last night, he won’t get very far. A wild-eyed, partially clothed Bittle running through the Haus wouldn’t raise eyebrows, but wild-eyed, partially clothed celebrity chef Eric Bittle running through the halls of a four-star hotel might.

“That was surprising but … not. I’m not out to anybody at Samwell, but you’re not the first —”

“I know,” Bittle says gently, and it occurs to Jack that of course he knows about Kent.

“It was a surprise, but I felt worse thinking I’d done something wrong. That I’d coerced you or —”

“Never. Never once, Jack. That’s not you. When we finally did, we took our time.” Bittle’s eyes suddenly grow wide and he giggles delightedly. “Does this mean I’m in bed with a younger man?”

That pulls a laugh out of Jack. “Sorry you didn’t get my younger body to go with my younger mind.”

“Hush. You’ve always been perfect to me.”

Jack can feel himself heat up under the warm intensity of Bittle’s gaze. He searches his eyes for any indication that he’s being less than genuine, but there’s nothing but affection, and love and — if Jack isn’t reading him wrong — maybe a little lust. 

But then Bittle pulls away again and starts talking about showers and breakfast. “Gosh, I didn’t realize it was so late,” he says, sliding out of bed. “If we’re going to do that shopping we wanted to get to before we head home, we need to get moving.” He turns back toward Jack. “We can talk about this some more over breakfast. I think I need a little time to process everything.”

Jack swallows around the lump that’s suddenly formed in his throat. Of course Bittle needs time. He’s had two days to process this. Bittle’s mind must be reeling. “Yeah,” he says. “Go ahead. I’ll just be right here.” He grabs the television remote control from the nightstand and turns on the TV. Instead of watching the morning news, though, he watches Bittle pull a small shaving kit and clean clothes out of the overnight bag in the corner.

“ _Jack_.” 

Jack manages to tear his eyes away from Bittle’s ass and look him in the eye. Bittle’s putting on his brave face, but Jack knows it’s a front.

“Jack, honey, it’s gonna be okay.” 

Bittle sounds so calm, so sure of himself. Jack should find this reassuring, but for some reason it only makes him feel worse. 

*

If telling Bittle accomplished one thing — easing Jack’s conscience — it’s caused new problems. Namely, Bittle is far more reserved around him than he has been. He knows it’s because on some level, he’s a stranger to Bittle, not quite the man he fell in love with. But it still stings, a little. He finds himself missing all the little kisses and pet names and affectionate compliments Bittle gives so freely.

“You shouldn’t treat me any differently,” Jack says as they walk to the little bistro Bittle’s decided on for breakfast. Despite it being his idea, Bittle had backtracked on breakfast in bed and insisted on going out. He’d also been a little more modest while getting ready for the day, showering with the door closed and dressing in the bathroom, as if Jack hasn’t spent the past few days viewing him in various states of undress. Jack suspects it’s to put a little bit of distance between them.

“I keep telling myself the same thing, but you have to understand, this is a little weird for me,” Bittle says blithely. “The last conversation you remember having with me ended with you telling me it was a lucky shot and leaving me alone to cry. I’ve had a lot of time to get over it, but you haven’t.”

“You cried?”

Bittle stops in the middle of the sidewalk. “Jack, I was going to quit the team. For a good 12 hours, anyway. But I realized I was being silly and quitting wouldn’t make my life any better, it would just cause a different set of complications.”

“You were going to quit the team because of me,” Jack says dully. He recalls their earlier conversation, about Johnson, and realizes he was at least part of the reason for Bittle’s rough transition to college hockey.

“ _Honey_.” Bittle tugs at the hem of Jack’s shirt to bring him closer and moves them out of the way so other pedestrians can pass.  “I didn’t quit the team. We worked things out, obviously. In about a year and a half in your timeline, we’re going to fall in love and we’ll be so, so happy. And you’re going to get to play hockey, too. Good hockey, the way you’ve always wanted to. You get to have it all.” He finds Jack’s hand and veers them back toward the path so they don’t miss the light. 

“I think that’s what’s been the hardest about all of this,” Jack confesses. “Not finding out that I’m with you, or suddenly becoming a father, or even having a shitty knee. It’s knowing I finally got to play, but not getting to experience it.”

“Hm,” Bittle hums as he starts walking again.

“What’s that?”

“I’m just thinking. Of course you’re upset about that.”

“Bittle, I’ve spent the last five years …”

“I know. You’ve worked hard. You’ve always worked hard, and you’ve always been the best. That’s not just my biased opinion; that’s what ESPN and a half-dozen sports writers said when you retired. But. You were more than ready to retire. Just so you know. Nobody forced you. Your body didn’t give out on you. You just decided it was time.”

Even though he’s spent his life surrounded by retired hockey players, Jack has never bothered to consider what might lie on the other side of the career he's so single-mindedly pursued. He's never stopped to think about how his father and “uncles” have lives they love that have nothing to do with the game. Samwell has been an insurance policy, a backup plan in case hockey doesn’t pan out. He’s never considered his degree might lead to an equally fulfilling post-retirement second act, or that he might find other things that matter just as much along the way.

Bittle’s still talking. “Do you know that if you’d come to me and said, ‘Bittle, I’ve been thinking —” his impression of Jack’s accent and delivery is scarily accurate — “‘and I’ve decided not to sign with a team. I’m going to take up farming, instead,’ I would’ve been a little concerned you weren’t thinking clearly, but I wouldn’t have loved you any less? The same goes for your parents. And our kids, Jack. Lord, Carter was just a baby when you retired. Neither one of them knows you as anything other than their papa. Someday they’ll know you won three Stanley Cups, and that you were the first out player in the NHL, and they’ll be so proud. But they’d be proud of you no matter what.”`

Jack has always been aware that people are interested in him, that there are reasons people want to be close to him that have nothing to do with who he is. As soon as he messes up or steps out of line, the interest fades or, worse, turns into tabloid fodder. Shy, awkward Jack Zimmermann was a disappointment until people started noticing his hockey talent, and then everybody wanted a piece of him. Anxious, draft-dropout Jack Zimmermann, who wasted his potential and failed to live up to the Zimmermann name, was a disappointment, too. At Samwell, he’s finally found a place where he can be himself most of the time, but outside the safe bubble of SMH, he’s a pretty face who’s good at hockey. In the wake of his overdose he’s all but faded from national attention, but with graduation looming, the voices that faded to a low hum are getting louder. He’s starting to feel the weight of all those expectations. Sometimes he worries they’ll crush him all over again.

Here on the other side, with Bittle, is reassurance that somebody wants all of him for who he is, not because of who he knows or how he looks or what he can do on the ice. Bittle’s love isn’t conditional, it just _is_.

He doesn’t yet know what he did to earn that, or how he’ll do it if he ever gets back to his own time, but he wants to try.

*

At breakfast Bittle orders mimosas, eggs, and something called avocado toast, chuckling about how now he gets to introduce Jack to all the trends that came and went.

Jack raises a skeptical eyebrow. “Is this on my nutrition plan?” he chirps.

Bittle waves away his concern. “For as long as you’re between there and here, there is no nutrition plan. Anyway, it’s avocado. Healthy fats. Oh!” he exclaims. “We should see if any of the bakeries around here are still making cronuts.”

Jack doesn’t know what a cronut is — or avocado toast, for that matter — but he’s pretty sure Bittle is going to make sure he finds out.

“Before we go on a culinary tour of the past two decades, maybe you can tell me a little more about us,” Jack proposes.

Bittle sets his glass down and smiles at Jack from across the table. “Well, sure. What do you want to know?”

 _So much_. “You told me how we fell in love … what happened after that?”

“ _Everything_. You want the quick, how-much-can-I-cover-before-our-food-gets-here version or the long version? Because you know I can talk.”

“Uh, quick version but don’t skip the important parts.”

“You kissed me after your graduation ceremony, we dated in secret for a good little while, we came out in the most public way possible,” Bittle begins, ticking each item off on his fingers. “I captained SMH and barely managed to graduate, we moved in together and lord, that sure was something, trying to figure out how to go from a long distance relationship to sharing everything but still being kind of long distance. I think it was harder than when I was still in school. We figured it out, and long vacations at our beach house after each season helped.” Bittle smirks. “It was almost like being newlyweds each time.”

“I’m sorry I missed it.” Knowing he's missed out on his entire career is devastating, but Jack has begun to realize that missing out on getting to be with one Eric Bittle during his sexual prime may be just as bad.

Bittle fans himself with his hand. “Oh, honey, you don’t know the half of it.” His cheeks flush a pretty shade of pink, as if he’s just remembered they’re in public. “Uh, in those first years I was as a PA at a local TV station but I kept up with my vlog because I got a lot of new viewers after the whole coming out mess —”

“Mess?”

“Most people were supportive, but there was some backlash. The Falcs were real good about helping us manage all of that. But I wasn’t out to my parents before, so they were a little shocked to see us kissing on TV. It all worked out; they love you.” He takes a long sip of his drink. “Uh, we were kind of busy with our careers for a long time but we had the most beautiful wedding, and after I signed the contract for my show and you started talking retirement, we started to think about having kids. Oh!” Bittle abruptly slams his champagne glass down on the table; a bit of his mimosa splashes onto the tablecloth. “I made Beyoncé’s birthday cake!”

“Did that … have something to do with the kids?”

“Well, no, but it was the single greatest day of my life after marrying you and seeing each of our babies for the first time.”

Jack can’t help it; he full on belly laughs at that.

Bittle’s cheeks flare pink again. “I know it’s silly, getting all excited over a celebrity —”

“No, no, I’m not laughing at you,” Jack reassures him. “I’m just … happy it made you so happy.”

Across from him, Bittle’s cheeks are still rosy and his eyes shine with happiness. Even knowing they worked things out, Jack wants to kick himself for wasting time making Bittle miserable when he could have been making him look like _this_.

“Anyway,” Bittle continues, “that was a real bright spot during that time because having a baby took a little bit of work, and there were some disappointments along the way. It took some time to figure out, but we eventually found a surrogate and Carter was born about a year before you retired. We did it all again a couple years after that and got our Birdy.” He sighs dreamily. "And we all lived happily ever after." He punctuates the end of his story by draining his mimosa and setting his empty glass on the table.

“They’re really good kids.”

“We have our hands full,” Bittle says with a fond smile, “but yeah. We got really lucky with those two. If only we could get Birdy to use the potty and get Carter to make it through an entire hockey practice without melting down.”

Jack laughs. “If those are our biggest problems, I’d say our life is pretty perfect.”

Bittle beams. “I’m not fooling myself; we both put our parents through a lot when we were younger. I suspect with kids there’ll always be _something_. But you’re right, Sweetpea. Our life is pretty perfect.” He clasps his hands in front of him on the table; as he does, Jack's eye is drawn to the simple band he wears on his left ring finger.

Jack's been wearing its twin for the past two days. It's a physical reminder that everything Bittle's just told him is real. It's not a story he would have thought to write for himself, but now he can't imagine it unfolding any other way. 

 _Make this happen_ , Jack tells himself, again, as their waiter comes by and refills their glasses. If he ever gets back to their  _before_ , he needs to remember to make this happen.


	6. Chapter 6

“I know this is weird for you,” Bittle says on their drive home. After breakfast, they’d done a little bit of shopping, stopping at a children's bookstore to pick up a book Bittle had ordered for a friend's baby, and a menswear boutique so he could choose a new bowtie for himself. It matches the lining of Jack’s suit, and Jack had found the purchase both endearing and reassuring. “I wish I knew how to fix it.”

“I don’t know if there’s anything to fix,” Jack replies, feeling a bit stubborn. He’s already made his decision.

“We’ll get through this,” is all Bittle says. He doesn’t say anything more for a long time. Then: “I understand if you need some time to figure things out. If you want to stay with your parents for a bit, or —” He looks like he might cry. It’s an understandable reaction, Jack thinks, considering Bittle has just found himself in the unexpected position of telling his partner of almost two decades that it’s okay if he wants to take some time apart.

“What? No. Why would you think that?” Jack knows why Bittle would think that, but he needs to hear it.

“If our roles were reversed, I would be feeling all sorts of things. I’ve been loving you for almost 20 years, but you’re not there yet. I understand if you need some space away from us.”

Jack considers this. Doing what Bittle’s suggesting will surely lead to questions and disappointment from his parents, turmoil for Bittle and the kids, and the sort of media attention the family didn’t ask for and doesn’t need. And if Jack does, eventually, manage to get back to his correct time, it might irrevocably screw things up for his future self. No, he decides, it’s better to ride this out.

“I may not be _there yet_ , as you say, but I’m not going to go live with my parents just because they’re more familiar. You and the kids are my family. I just need practice.”

“Practice,” Bittle huffs, and Jack fears he’s made him mad until he grins. “At least I know you’re still my Jack.”

*

Practice, as it turns out, is easier than acting. Jack can spend hours reading and watching his own history, but only practice will get him through his day-to-day life.

“You’re the kids’ primary caregiver,” Bittle tells him, “but I usually take a break during the summer so we can spend time together as a family. One of the holdovers from the NHL schedule. It dictated our life for so long it’s justkind of stuck. But I’m lucky that my show films in the spring, and I can work on my books and blog posts from my home office. I’ve put a hold on most guest appearances until after your surgery. Guess that’s a good thing, since I have time to show you the ropes.”

Bittle teaching _Jack_ is something new. In the short time they’ve known each other, the balance of power has clearly been in Jack’s favor. He is, after all, Bittle’s captain. From everything he’s gathered about their current relationship, theirs is a marriage of equals. But right now, they’re hardly on equal footing. He has to trust Bittle to lead. It’s a little weird, at first, but hardly unwelcome. Bittle’s a good and patient teacher.

Jack might prefer a playbook, but in some ways being thrown into fatherhood is easier because he doesn’t have time to think about whether or not he’s doing things the right way, he just _does_. The days are a blur of meal prep and trips to the park and toddler negotiations. To his credit, Bittle doesn’t laugh or scold when Jack makes a mistake — and there are _a lot_ of mistakes. Some are funny (the next time he lets the kids finger paint in the back yard, he’ll remember to put newspapers down) and some are barely-averted disasters (turns out four-year-olds, unlike hockey bros, have not yet developed a tolerance for eating Bagel Bites straight from the oven), but Bittle always reassures him that he’s “doing great.”

On Tuesday afternoon, Jack steps on a Lego and lets out a shriek that scares the dog and a string of Quebecois swear words that would make his father blush. Bittle laughs and tells him now he’s a real dad.

*

Bittle pulls a book from his nightstand. “Do you mind if I read for a little while before we turn out the lights?”

“No, ah, that’s fine.” Jack takes the iPad off his own nightstand.

Soon, Bittle’s buried in his book — based on the cover, it’s about a baker who solves mysteries — and Jack finds himself, once again, tumbling down the rabbit hole of internet videos.

He’s bookmarked a few from the first Cup win — specifically, the kiss on the ice — and those are the ones he keeps returning to. A couple of different news outlets got the shot, and there are one or two shaky videos taken from a distance that must have been captured by sharp-eyed fans in the stands. Each shows, from a slightly different angle, Bittle and Jack racing toward each other and embracing. In some, he can see they’re having a conversation, though none of the footage picks it up. Jack can only guess at what they might have said to each other before he meets Bittle in the kiss that changed both of their lives.

He watches himself kiss Bittle, over and over again, until he feels Bittle’s hand on his arm. “It was very romantic,” he says. “And a little scary.”

“Why was it scary?” They look happy, Jack thinks.

“Because neither of us knew what was going to happen next. Just imagine, if some NHL rookie were to come out right now — your right now, not my right now — and introduce his boyfriend to the world.”

“It would be a circus.”

Bittle nods. “You knew that, and you did it anyway. For us.”

 _It was a lucky shot_. Jack still doesn’t understand how they got from _there_ , to _here_ , but there’s no question that by the time they came out, they were sure about each other.

“How does it make feel, seeing that?” Bittle tentatively asks.

 _Warm_. _Happy_. _Loved._

“I keep thinking about how good it must have felt,” Jack finally says. “It doesn’t feel scary.”

And it doesn’t, he realizes. Lots of things are scary. He’s spent most of his life being afraid of one thing or another. Maybe all this time, he’s just been afraid to be happy.

*

“Mr. Zimmermann, this is, without question, the best meal you’ve ever cooked for me.”

There’s a joke in there, Jack thinks, but he doesn’t think Bittle is being mean about the frozen chicken tenders and fries he insisted on making while Bittle played with the kids. If he’s going to be a member of this family, cooking dinner for his husband and children is the least he can do.

Even if dinner is frozen convenience food and some sad broccoli he found in the back of the refrigerator.

“Papa makes the best chicken tenders,” Carter says as he carefully dips a piece of chicken in a little cup of honey mustard, which he’d helped Bittle prepare as Jack plated their food.

“He does, doesn’t he?” Bittle offers Jack a tiny smile from across the table.

“The best the best!” Carter cheers.

“What about the homemade ones I made you last week? ” Bittle asks. “Should I put them in my new book?”

The book Bittle is working on is a compilation of easy-to-make meals and desserts that families can make together. Everything is Bittle-Zimmermann tested and approved.

“No,” Carter declares. “Put Papa’s in.”

“Sorry, Bittle. I guess you’ll just have to try harder next time,” Jack chirps.

Bittle laughs. “Just remember where your pie comes from.”

Carter does (wisely, Jack thinks) remember where the pie comes from, and asks Bittle about dessert after dinner. “Can I have that mint ice cream?” He gazes at Bittle with those big eyes that Jack, personally, finds impossible to deny.

“That mint ice cream,” Bittle says, “is for daddies. You can have one of your fruit bars. Would you like orange or strawberry?”

Carter selects an orange popsicle only after Birdy chooses the same. “Let’s eat outside,” Bittle suggests. “It’s less messy.”

Later, Jack decides “less messy” is Bittle’s way of saying “not in my house.” After dessert and another half hour of outdoor play, both kids require baths — a task Jack has been able to manage pretty well on his own, though crouching over the tub isn’t the easiest on his knee.

“Bittle? A little help?” he calls from the bathroom, where he’s attempting to control a splashing Birdy. “I think Carter took her duck with him when he got out, and she won’t sit still,” he says when Bittle pokes his head in.

“Got your back, babe.” A few minutes later, Bittle tosses the missing duck to Jack, who catches it one-handed while using the other to keep Birdy from wiggling away. “You wanna hand me those clothes on the floor?”

Jack throws a pink onesie, blue shorts, and Carter’s wet towel in Bittle’s direction, eyes never leaving their daughter.

“Daddy,” Carter whines, lurching into the doorway, “I need help with my night-nights. I’m stuck!”

The poor kid has somehow managed to put his head and arm through his head hole of his sleep shirt and is, indeed, stuck. Jack hides a smile and catches Bittle doing the same as he helps Carter right himself.

“Pa!” Birdy yells, splashing to get Jack’s attention. He ends up with a face and chest full of water. “Wash me!”

“You heard the girl,” Bittle says as he scoops Carter up. “Wash her.”

Jack chuckles to himself, a little amazed at how easily he’s taken to being bossed around by two tiny people.

 

“They’ll sleep well tonight,” Bittle says when both kids are in bed for the night.

“I will too.” Jack pulls his shirt, still wet from bathing Birdy, over his head. It’s just as well because there’s a large orange popsicle stain down the front. “I think more of Carter’s popsicle ended up on me than in his stomach.”

“Lord, don’t I know it,” Bittle commiserates. The hem of his shirt is also stained orange, from where Birdy grabbed at him with sticky hands. “Why do you think I save the good ice cream for us?” He throws a clean shirt from the laundry pile on the bed at Jack and grabs another for himself. “I’ll start the laundry if you want to get the dishes.”

Jack does the dishes and, for good measure, prepares two bowls of ice cream after finding the mostly-full container of mint chocolate chip in the fridge. “I don’t know if you feel like it,” he says as he offers it to Bittle, second guessing himself.

“This is perfect,” Bittle says happily. “Do you want to take it outside?”

They sit on opposite ends of the porch swing and eat silently. The ice cream is sweet, but there’s a sharp bite to it that catches Jack by surprise. He contemplates this as the shadows grow long around them.

“I didn’t realize it was possible for parenting to be as physically exhausting as hockey,” he finally says through a yawn.

“It’s just a different kind of tired,” Bittle says. “In hockey, you get breaks.”

“Ha ha.”

“I’ve still got your back, though. That’s never gonna change.”

Jack being Jack, he’s never given a lot of thought to what he looks for in a potential partner, other than the obvious: blond, athletic, smaller than he is. Bittle is all of those things, but he is also kind, funny, caring, competent. It’s a shame the only memories Jack has of playing hockey with him are from so early on. He would have loved to have been Bittle’s partner on the ice.

“Thank you,” Bittle finally says, setting his bowl in his lap.

“For what?”

“For giving us a chance.”

“Bittle, you’re my —”

“I know, I know,” he says, angling himself toward Jack and drawing a knee up to his chest. “We’re your family. I guess I’m just a little worried you’re going to wake up tomorrow, or a week or month from now, and decide we’re not worth it. You’re right. You’ve missed … a lot. And it can’t be easy to step into this life when you were preparing for something else entirely.”

“I was focused on something else when we met. I don’t think I knew it was okay to want more.” Now, he has so much.

“No, I don’t think you did.”

“Did you?”

Bittle’s laugh is sharp and sweet. “Want more?”

Jack nods.

Bittle takes his time replying. “I never really thought about it until I met you. I _wanted_ , I just didn’t think I’d get to have it. I struggled with it more than you did.”

“I’ve struggled,” Jack protests.

“I know. And that’s not what I mean. I’m not talking about your mental health right now. I’m talking about the way we were raised. Your parents were there for you at your lowest point. They knew, pretty early on, about you and Kent, and they just rolled with it. When you told them things were serious between us, they had concerns about how we might be treated if we came out, but they didn’t try to talk you out of it. Even when you and your dad weren’t getting along, you knew he was there for you.”

“Did you not have that?” Mentally, Jack chastises himself for not recognizing Bittle might have been dealing with more than just checking anxiety when he first got to Samwell. Even with the extra time they've spent in checking practice, he hasn’t made an effort to get to know him. Some captain he is.

“Honey, I was a closeted gay kid in Georgia. My parents love me, but I was never really sure they’d accept me if they knew. I couldn’t even say the word ‘gay’ until I’d been at Samwell for months. And then I spent years wondering what would happen if they found out. If they didn’t accept me and disowned me, how would I finish school? If I had to leave school, where would I go?”

“We would have figured something out. I would have helped,” Jack says, confident he would do that for any teammate.

“It’s all water under the bridge now,” Bittle says. “It took some time, and there were a lot of tears, but we worked it out. I just wish I could tell that scared 18-year-old he’d be this happy.”

“If I ever see him again, I’ll tell him for you.”

Bittle scoots a little closer and takes both of Jack’s hands in his, never breaking eye contact. “If you make it back to see him, make sure you tell yourself that, too."

"I'm pretty sure he's figured that out," Jack says, holding Bittle's gaze.

"Has he?"

Jack nods, just once, and something in the gesture must give Bittle the reassurance he needs because he takes a deep breath. "Okay, then." He abruptly slides off the swing, pulling Jack to his feet as well. “Let’s go inside. I need to shower this day off me.”

Bittle smells like sweat, orange popsicle, and the baby powder-scented body wash they used to bathe the kids. The combination shouldn’t be so intoxicating. Jack moves in closer and buries his face in the spot between Bittle’s ear and shoulder, inhaling deeply. 

Bittle drops his hand and swats at him. “What are you doing, you big goof? Are you … _smelling_ me?” he accuses.

“You smell good.” 

“Your seduction technique needs work. I can see why things didn’t work out with Camilla,” Bittle says tartly. He slips away before Jack can protest, and is halfway up the stairs before Jack is in the house.

“That was a low blow, Bittle,” Jack says, a little breathlessly, when he finally catches up to him in their bedroom. “Running away when I can’t even catch you.”

Bittle looks over his shoulder and bats _those eyes_ at Jack. “Good thing you’ve already got me.” That flirtatious tone from _before_ is almost back.

“Do I?” Jack grins and begins to take his shirt off, a move (his only move, if he’s being honest) that, in his limited experience, has almost always worked.

“As if I haven’t seen that little striptease and eyebrow thing you do hundreds of times,” Bittle says with a roll of his eyes. He yelps a little when Jack snaps him with his t-shirt, but it turns into laughter when he retaliates with his own well-placed blow. “I didn’t say it doesn’t still work! I just said it’s not new!” he protests as Jack muscles him toward the bed. “Not here! Not — ahh! I just washed these sheets! We smell like outside!”

“I like it,” Jack insists, nuzzling into Bittle’s neck again. 

“Well, _you_ can change the sheets then,” Bittle grouses. “This is not a frat house.”

“It's not? Sure feels like it sometimes. I stepped in a mystery puddle in the kids' bathroom today.”

“Ew." Bittle wrinkles his nose. “That's it,” he says, making a move to extricate himself from Jack’s arms. “We're definitely taking showers.”

“Can’t. Too tired. Too comfortable.” The weight of the day has settled over him, and getting up suddenly requires more energy than he has. He halfheartedly pulls Bittle back down on top of him and drapes his arm across his chest.

“Come on, mister. I might need help washing my back.” The flirtatious tone is _definitely_ back.

“You mock my seduction technique and come back with _that_? You can do better, Bits.”

“Can I?" Bittle arches an eyebrow. “Shower’s pretty big. What's the point of having room for two if we always have to shower alone?”

“I’ve actually been wondering about that.”

“I can show you,” Bittle says, almost shyly.

Suddenly, Jack isn't very tired anymore.


	7. Chapter 7

At 23 — the age Jack still thinks of himself as even if his body and the calendar suggest otherwise — Jack has had a fair amount of sex, though probably not as much as people would expect.

Whether or not he’s had _good_ sex is up for debate.

Sex with Kent was always quick and dirty. They were dumb, horny teenagers who didn’t know what they were doing, only that it felt good — and a little dangerous. That one time with Kate was relatively sober, at least, but still quick and awkward. Samantha was Jack’s first partner who actually told him what she wanted, and she encouraged him to use his words to ask for the same. They weren’t together long enough for it to matter.

Sex with Camilla is like a contest. They’re two athletes in their prime, and their work ethic and competitive spirit carries over into the bedroom. They don’t spend a lot of time on pleasantries before getting into it.

Bittle is the first partner he’s had who makes him feel desirable. He talks to him, says his name, knows all the ways to make him feel good. Because of course he does; they’ve been doing some variation of this for almost two decades. 

They are, admittedly, a little frenzied when they fall onto the bed, still damp. Jack would like to continue the exploration of Bittle’s body that he began in the shower, but Bittle slows him down. “There’s no rush, honey,” he says, straddling Jack and pressing a hand to his chest. “We’ve got time.”

Time is a funny thing. Entire lives can be lived in the split second between a puck glancing off his stick and going into the net. Yet the game itself begins and ends in the blink of an eye. When Bittle says they have time, Jack isn’t sure if he’s talking about tonight or the rest of their lives. But he’s right. They don’t have to rush this. This isn’t sneaking around in Juniors with Kent, or trying to see who can come first with Camilla. This is _Bittle_. And by some magical stoke of luck, he gets to have this before he should.

“I want to make our first time good for you,” Bittle murmurs as he kisses all the way down Jack’s body. He quickly homes in on the sensitive spots behind his ear and above his hip, giving him chills despite the weather outside.

“Bittle —”

Bittle abruptly lifts his head and meets Jack’s eye. He’s always looking him in the eye. “Is this okay?”

“It’s — ” Jack can’t quite find the words to convey just how _right_ it feels, so he settles on “good.”

“Just ‘good?’” Bittle teases, before rising up again and nipping at the underside of his jaw.

“Um —”

“We’ll come back to that,” Bittle says, laughing as his hand moves lower. “You just let me take care of you.”

When Jack comes, everything goes white and silent for a split second before he hears goal sirens in his head. That’s never happened before, either.

Afterward, Bittle continues to lavish attention on every part of Jack, especially the parts Jack doesn’t recognize from _before_. Expected, given his age and a career playing a contact sport, but still startling. “Skate blade,” Bittle murmurs, ghosting his lips over a scar on Jack’s wrist that he’s been wondering about. “Playoff game against the Schooners in ’19.”

“What’s this?” Jack touches the scar on his chin that he sees every time he looks in the mirror.

“Puck. Right before our wedding. Doctor did a good job fixing you up so it didn’t show too much in the pictures.” He presses afeather-light kiss to that spot. Then to the stretch marks on his sides. Then to his knee, the bad one, which has no visible scars now but will, ironically, sport a scar after tomorrow’s surgery.

“Do you have any?”

“You’ll laugh.”

“I won’t.”

“It’s not even from hockey.” Bittle rolls off of Jack and props himself up on one elbow. “Right here.” Jack follows Bittle’s finger to a silvery two-inch scar on his left pectoral. “We were playing with Tater’s cat and something startled her. She got me real good and ruined my favorite shirt.”

“Bad kitty.” Jack’s trying to sound sexy, but it comes out a bit stilted. He’d blame it on being out of practice, but it’s not like he’s had a lot of practice at this. Very few of his sexual encounters have involved this amount of conversation. He kisses the spot, drawing a giggle out of Bittle. “Is that — is that okay?”

“You don’t have to ask. You don’t have to ask to touch me.”

“Will you show me?”

Bittle shows him, guiding Jack’s hands to the right places, helping him learn the things some other version of him already knows. He feels an irrational urge to compete with this version of himself, to prove to Bittle he can be just as good.

“You don’t have to be perfect,” Bittle says. “Lord knows it took us some time to figure things out the first time around.”

“I want it to be good for you,” Jack insists, a concern he’s never had with anyone else.

“It’s always good with you,” Bittle whispers, equally stubborn. It puts Jack at ease, a little. Enough that his hands stop shaking.

Bittle tugs at Jack’s hair with both hands and hums softly when Jack takes his dick in his mouth, a constant, comforting tone that gets louder as he gets more aroused. Jack is half expecting a scream to explode out of him, would kind of like to see what it takes to make Bittle scream, but then he remembers the kids down the hall and figures they must be good at being quiet.

“Oh, honey. Jack Jack _Jack_ ,” Bittle moans when he comes, and if there’s any sound in the world that Jack loves as much as the sound of a goal siren, it’s hearing Bittle, utterly wrecked, repeating his name like a prayer.

 

There’s a strange sort of cognitive dissonance in following up the best sex of his life with a crying four-year-old climbing into their bed at 4 am, but this is Jack’s life now. He wakes to the creaking of the door, and Carter’s light footsteps.

“Daddy? Papa? Can I sleep in here tonight?”In the sliver of moonlight he’s standing in, his large eyes are bright with tears.

Bittle rolls away from Jack and pulls his phone from the nightstand. Jack winces against the sudden glare.

“Carter, honey, it’s the middle of the night. Let’s get you back to your own bed, huh?”

“I’m scared and I want to sleep with you!” Carter wails.

“Shh,” Bittle whispers. “Papa’s sleeping. What’s making you feel scared?”

“Not sleeping,” Jack murmurs, now wide awake. “What’s the matter, bud?”

“There’s a shark in my room.”

“Uh oh.” Jack glances at Bittle. As a kid, he used to have a recurring nightmare about a runaway Zamboni eating his parents. When that happened, Maman would gather him in her arms and let him fall asleep beside her while Papa checked the house to rid it of any unauthorized heavy machinery. Now, he imagines being the hero who vanquishes his son’s nightmares. “Why don’t you come cuddle with Daddy while I scare the shark away?”

“No.” Carter clutches his rabbit to his chest and shakes his head emphatically.

“No?”

“You’re more cuddly than Daddy. I want you."

Bittle’s on it. He quickly slides out of bed and picks Carter up, gently depositing him beside Jack. “I’ll be right back.”

Carter snuggles close to Jack. “It was eating my window.” 

“That sounds scary.”  

“He was going to eat me and Birdy, and you and Daddy and Daisy,” Carter whimpers. “But Daddy’s going to scare it away.” He burrows into Jack’s side, wiping his runny nose on Jack’s clean shirt.

“Daddy will scare it away,” Jack agrees. He presses a gentle kiss to Carter’s sleep-matted hair. In the morning, he and Bittle may laugh about this privately, but right now he understands Carter’s fear is very real.

“And you’ll keep me safe,” Carter says with certainty. His little sigh of contentment as he presses himself against Jack and closes his eyes breaks Jack’s heart and reassembles it all over again.

“Shark is gone, sweetheart,” Bittle whispers when he returns. “I told him to go home.” But Carter is already asleep. Jack isn’t even sure if he was really fully awake. 

  
Jack wakes when the first rays of morning light begin to peek through the bedroom window, when he realizes his arm has fallen asleep under Carter, still tucked up against him. The stuffed rabbit has migrated to a perch on Jack’s chest. Everything feels more stiff than usual and he realizes it’s because Carter has spent the past two hours kicking him.

Bittle’s already awake, quietly scrolling through his phone. He’s wearing reading glasses, thin wire-framed things that make him look vaguely professorial.

“Mornin’,” Bittle whispers over Carter’s head when he catches Jack staring at him. His accent is always stronger in the morning, sweet and slow and very Southern.

“Have you always worn those?” Jack asks. Once again, he’s reminded there’s so much he doesn’t yet know about Bittle. Most of their conversations have revolved around the kids.

“These?” Bittle’s hand drifts toward the glasses. “Just broke down and got ‘em last year when I realized I kept having to increase the font while drafting blog posts.”

“Probably doesn’t help that you’re always looking at that thing in bed,” Jack says, gently knocking the phone out of his hand.

“I’ll have you know, Mister Zimmermann, that this is very important business.”

“Uh huh,” Jack chirps, taking a peek at the screen. “Tweeting at the local library about the new preschool program registration is _very_ important.” He gives the phone back to Bittle. “Hi,” he whispers.

Bittle sets his phone on his nightstand but leaves the glasses on and shifts to face Jack. “Hi,” he whispers back.

They stare at each other for what could be hours, or just a minute. Jack wonders how many hours he’s spent getting lost in those eyes.

“Some night that was, huh? I thought we might have a reprise this morning but —”Bittle glances at Carter — “we’re gonna need to reschedule.”

“’S’okay,” Jack says, gently moving Carter’s arm so he can stretch. He waits for the feeling to come back to his arm. “I’m kind of sore.”

“From the physical activity or Carter’s kicking?” Bittle asks, plucking the rabbit off Jack’s chest and settling it on his own.

“Both.” After last night, he’ll never complain about Shitty kicking his shins and stealing the covers again.

“Well, that’s why we try to make sure they stay in their own beds. One of us is kind of a pushover, though.”

“Not me.”

Bitle’s smug “hm” makes it clear he begs to differ. “Well, I wouldn’t have predicted it either when we met, Mister Eat More Protein.”

“What’s your favorite thing to bake?” Jack asks, because he’s still thinking about all the things he doesn’t know about Bittle.

“Well, I suppose it’s whatever the person I’m baking for likes best,” Bittle says thoughtfully. “Your favorite is my sour cherry pie. Carter likes brownies. Birdy’ll eat anything sweet, but right now she likes these tiny chocolate chip cookies I make for her. Birdy Bites, we call ‘em. Somehow, I always end up giving her just one more. They’re going in the book.”

Jack laughs quietly because he can too easily imagine Birdy asking for more in her sweet voice. “Ah. Now who’s the pushover parent?”

“Oh, fine. I’m guilty too. I can’t help it if our kids are so darn cute.”

“So what do you like to make for yourself? If nobody else is around, and you can make what you want, what would it be?”

“Well, I _did_ write two whole cookbooks about pie …” Bittle absently worries at a worn spot on the rabbit’s ear with his thumb and forefinger, as if it will help him divine an answer. “I’d have to choose apple, I guess. It’s a whole process, what with peeling and slicing the apples. Some people find it tedious, but I have a good little system; I don’t really have to think about it anymore. I just get started and let my mind wander and before I know it I have a pie. I’ve usually worked out all my problems, too. And it’s what —”

“What —” Jack prompts.

“I was teaching you to make it, when I first realized I had feelings for you.”

“Oh.” Jack feels like he should know this. He _would_ know this, if he hadn’t gotten into this bizarre time travel/swapped body/whatever-this-is situation. He feels like he could spend the next 20 years learning everything he’s missed and it still wouldn’t be enough.

“I can teach you, later today. When Birdy’s napping?”

“Will you?” Jack can’t even remember the last time he baked. Maybe with Papa, during the winter break after his first semester at Samwell. They hadn’t made anything so elaborate as pie, though. Chocolate chip cookies were more their speed.

“Honey —” Bittle chuckles softly — “I love baking, and I love baking with you. Of course I will.”

Something settles inside of Jack. He’ll never understand why Bittle’s just rolling with this, but he’s grateful. “That would be nice.”

“Of course, that means I’ll have to go to the store and get apples. And maybe we can do a cherry too, since they’re in season.” Bittle types into his phone and he mutters names of ingredients to himself. Between them, Carter shifts in his sleep again, throwing an arm over Jack’s chest.

“We haven’t scared you off yet, have we?” Bittle asks, setting his phone to the side again.

“Why would I be scared?”

“Well, last night was pretty ...”

“Eventful?”

“In more ways than one,” Bittle agrees. “It’s a lot of emotional vulnerability for a hockey robot.”

Coming from anybody else it might chafe, but Bittle’s gentle chirping is sweet and light.

“You know I’m more than that,” Jack whispers.

“I know that,” Bittle retorts. “Do you?”

Carter sighs again, a breathy, content little sound. Whatever he’s dreaming about must be nicer than the dream that brought him into their bed. “He wanted me last night,” Jack says, unable to keep the incredulity from his voice.

“Well, duh,” Bittle says blithely. “You’ve always been their first choice when they need to feel secure. I’d take offense, but Carter’s right: You _are_ the best at cuddling. It’s easy to feel safe with you.”

“Okay, but _you_ being the one to go off into the dark and scare away the monsters … I didn’t see that one coming.” Certainly, Jack would not expect the kid who still cowers in fear when he _knows_ he’s about to take one of Jack’s gentle practice checks would be the nightmare-slaying parent.

“Shh.” Bittle exaggeratedly puts a finger to his lips. “I’m hoping to ride this out as long as I can. It won’t be long before they realize I can’t protect them from everything. Or until their problems get so big we _can’t_ protect them.”

Jack thinks about his parents, about how helpless they must have felt when he went off the rails. He’s never considered what it must have felt like from their side. “How do you keep yourself from worrying about every bad thing that can happen to them?” Ever since that horrible day at the pool, he hasn’t been able to stop himself from worrying.

“Well, you just do.” Bittle reaches across Carter and squeezes Jack’s hand, as if he knows where his thoughts have wandered. “If I started to think about every bad thing that might happen to them, I’d never leave this bed. At the end of the day, there’s so much that’s out of our hands. I’d rather focus on making sure they have what they need to be good people. Anyway, a little bit of worry is a good thing. It means you’re doing a good job.”

“Did you get that from your therapist?”

“Your dad. He has a little experience living through one of those worst case scenarios.”

“I used to think he didn’t worry enough.”

“Well.” Bittle’s still caressing the rabbit’s ear. “We’ve both had to work through stuff with our parents. But you should know that he called you after every single game, right up until you retired, to find out how you were doing. Not how many goals you scored, or how many assists you got, but to find out how you _felt_. And if I know him, he’ll text me as soon as you’re out of surgery to ask how it went. Your mama too. They don’t take any of this for granted.”

After it all, after Jack had blown up his future and the world’s perception of his perfect family, Papa had been the one to sit quietly with him during those first weeks when he found it difficult to leave his bed for more than an hour or so at a time. Maman was the one who kept her distance. She hadn’t been absent, exactly, but later told him she couldn’t be in the same room with him. He’d always thought Papa would hold it against him if he quit hockey, but it was Maman’s anger that had been palpable, a fourth presence in their formerly happy home.

For weeks, she’d been unable to look at him. “I’m just so fucking angry all the time!” she’d yelled during a family therapy appointment. “We’ve given you fucking everything, and you just threw it all away!” Months later, she’d asked him to run her dry-cleaning upstairs and he’d found a fist-sized hole in the wall of her walk-in closet.

Jack had been too alone in his own misery to care about his mother’s, but now he understands, just a little more, why she might have felt that way. If getting Carter to eat a cheeseburger is an exercise in frustration, watching Jack crash and burn and almost die must have been excruciating.

“Yeah,” he says with a heavy sigh. They’d never spoken of the hole in Maman’s closet, but before leaving for Samwell he’d secretly and inexpertly patched it over using a drywall repair kit purchased from the hardware store. It stood out, a messy scar on the otherwise smooth wall, but at least the damage wasn't quite so obvious. He hopes everything he’s done since then — getting into Samwell, his career, Bittle and the kids — have in some small way made up for the hell he put his parents through.

“Do you want to go back to sleep for a bit? It’s still kind of early. I’ll make breakfast and get Birdy up.”

Jack _is_ tired. It wouldn’t hurt to sleep in a little longer, he thinks as a yawn escapes.

“That a yes?” Bittle holds the rabbit up and tilts its head to the side, like it’s waiting for his answer.

“Yes,” Jack says with a chuckle. He won’t sleep, but he doesn’t mind watching his son sleep for just a little while longer. 

 

Carter is in much brighter spirits when he relates the night’s adventure to Birdy over breakfast. “Daddy scared the shark away with my hockey stick,” he tells her, embellishing a little. “And Papa let me snuggle with him.”

Birdy, wide-eyed, “oohs” and “ahs” around the spoonful of yogurt she’s shoved into her mouth. Yogurt is everywhere: her hair, her hands, the placemat Bittle set in front of her in a futile effort to contain the inevitable mess.

“Yogurt was a good idea,” Jack chirps as Bittle clucks over the yogurt on her shirt.

“Yogurt is great,” Carter says, scraping the bottom of his own bowl with his spoon. “Can I have some more?”

“Maybe for a snack later,” Bittle says. “How about some toast?”

“I don’t like toast,” Carter whines. Eventually, they compromise and Bittle gives him a plain slice of bread slathered in apricot jam. Immediately, a large blob of jam drips off of the bread and lands on Carter’s collar. Bittle throws up his hands in a “what can you do?” gesture. Jack just shakes his head and turns back to an email detailing final pre-op instructions before tomorrow’s surgery.

“I can’t eat or drink after midnight,” he tells Bittle.

“No midnight snacks tonight, I guess,” Bittle says. It’s a joke but there’s probably a grain of truth to it, Jack thinks, given the amount of baked goods in this house at any given time.

“Ha ha.” He continues to scan the document on his phone. “PT starts early next week?”

“It’ll be a long road,” Bittle says. “Doctors say nine months, at least. But you’ll be able to coach your team from the sidelines. Guess who signed up to assist.”

“You?”

“I _did_ captain a winning NCAA hockey team,” Bittle replies, smug. “By winter you may be able to get on the ice with the kids, too. Birdy’ll be just about ready for her first pair of skates, and if I know her, she’ll want to keep up with Carter.”

Memories of skating with Papa, passing the puck back and forth and sending it into the unmanned net, surface in Jack’s memory. He’ll have to get the recipe for the hot chocolate Maman always made to warm him up after practice with Papa. “That sounds like a good goal.”

Bittle's smile is warm and radiant. "Let's make it happen, then."

 

“Two for two,” Bittle says when breakfast is over and both kids are, again, covered in food. “Carter, honey, don’t touch that, your hands are all sticky!” He tears a baby wipe from the package on the counter and hands it to Carter. “Let’s clean up before we read books.”

Jack glances at the kids, one covered in yogurt and raspberries and the other in jam. It’s going to take a lot more than a baby wipe to deal with this mess. “You know what,” he says, slowly getting to his feet, “why don’t we play in the sprinkler?”

Carter pauses and looks at Jack with suspicion. “It’s morning,” he points out. They usually play in the sprinkler before bed, when the sun has started to go down and it’s not quite as hot.

“Uh, yeah. It’s a special day. I’m having surgery tomorrow, and I have to rest tonight and go to bed early,” Jack improvises. From the sink where he’s rinsing out his coffee mug, Bittle catches his eye and smiles.

“Oh,” Cater says, as if this explanation makes perfect sense. “Okay. Can I put my swimsuit on?”

Jack helps the kids into their swimsuits, getting yogurt and jam all over himself in the process.

Bittle finds them in the backyard 20 minutes later, the kids running circles around Jack, flat on his back in the grass. Water from the sprinkler rains down around them.

“What’re you doing on the ground?”

Originally, he’d intended to chase the kids until they tired out, but the exertion had finally gotten to his knee and it would not, he thinks, be a good idea to make things worse and put tomorrow’s surgery in jeopardy. He’d just been intending to rest a bit, but Carter and then Birdy had jumped on top of him and pinned him to the ground.

“Just looking at things from a different perspective,” he finally says.

Bittle shrugs and sinks to Jack’s level, taking his hand as he lies down next to him. Almost immediately, his light blue shirt begins to darken as the water soaks him as well. The sunlight catches on the mist from the sprinkler, lighting the world up like a rainbow. All Jack can hear is the kids’ happy, raucous laughter and Bittle’s more subdued chuckle. “Good morning?” Bittle asks.

“Good morning,” Jack agrees.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter briefly mentions a character coming out of surgery, though nothing about the surgery itself is described in great detail.

“Mr. Zimmermann?”

Jack is swimming. Head underwater, he can hear voices calling his name just above the surface. It takes a tremendous amount of effort to break through.

“Well, look who’s back. How are you feeling?” the face hovering above Jack asks. His brain latches onto a few additional words —  “easy” … “observation” … “recovery” … “husband” … before they slip away into the ether and he can’t hold onto them. He goes under, again.

 

 

Jack isn’t sure if it’s the same face or a different one he sees when he comes up minutes or hours later.

“Izzit done?” he slurs.

“Your surgery went just fine, Mr. Zimmermann. You’re in recovery now. I — ”

Jack loses the rest as another wave pulls him under.

 

  
A pair of dark eyes is all Jack sees, and maybe because they’re familiar, Jack tries to hold onto consciousness a little longer this time.

“Hey, Sweetpea. You awake?” Bittle’s face comes into focus and goes blurry again. Jack’s eyelids just feel so heavy.

“Izzit done?”

“It’s all done.” There’s a light pressure on Jack’s hand, and he realizes Bittle must be holding it. “Doctor says everything went well. Once the swelling goes down, you should feel much better. They want to keep you for observation for a bit and then we can go on home.”

Jack closes his eyes, satisfied, even if he’s forgotten the question.

 

 

“Bits? Izzit done?”

Jack doesn’t understand why Bittle’s laughing. “Yeah, honey, it’s done and you did real good.”

“Iz done?”

“It’s done.” To somebody else in the room, Bittle says, “He’s always had a hard time coming out of anesthesia. Makes him a little loopy.”

“Give it a little more time,” a female voice says. “We’ll start working on his discharge paperwork. The doctor will want to talk to both of you before you leave.”

Bittle’s still looking at Jack, a fond smile on his face. He’s cute like this.

“Well, I think you’re pretty cute, yourself,” Bittle says.

Jack doesn’t think he said that out loud, but he must have.

“It’s so nice to see a couple so in love after so many years,” the voice — Jack sees, now, that it belongs to his nurse — says.

“Not years,” Jack corrects. “Few weeks.”

“Poor thing still sounds confused,” the nurse says. “Don’t worry, this happens all the time.”

“We didn’t like each other,” Jack continues, “and we fought. And then I woke up and Bittle was just _there_.”

The nurse presses a hand to her heart.

“Sometimes it does kind of feel like it happened that way, doesn’t it?” Bittle asks. He winks at Jack and gives his hand another little squeeze.

“I’m tired, Bits,” Jack replies.

“You can rest some more,” Bittle reassures him. I’ll be right here when you wake up.”

 

It’s after noon when Jack finally wakes up enough for it to register that he’s out of surgery, that that’s the reason he’s in a hospital bed with Bittle by his side.

“How’re you feeling, Sweetpea?”

“Ouch,” Jack says.

“Yeah, I bet. The doctor wants to go over some exercises with you before you’re discharged. Think you’re up for that?”

Jack grimaces. He’s in a lot of pain, but it won’t do any good to delay his recovery. Already, he’s been off of the ice longer than … well, he can’t remember when he last took more than a day off. His life is different now, he knows, but he misses it. Things will never be the same as before, but he can still skate. He can still coach. He can do all of those things, if he prioritizes his recovery.

Bittle’s phone pings with an incoming text.

“Your dad,” he says before he even looks at it.. “He’s been texting me every half hour. I’ll let him know you’re awake.” Jack watches him tap out the reply, finding the clicking sound as his fingers fly over the touch screen oddly soothing. Bittle often texts and posts to his social media accounts in bed and Jack hadn’t realized, until now, how used to the rapid-fire _click-click-click_ he’s become.

When Papa has been sufficiently updated, Jack’s doctor talks them through some easy exercises, and leaves him with instructions to repeat them several times a day, a prescription for painkillers, and orders to follow up with his physical therapist’s office for rehab.

Claudia, the nurse who was there when Jack came to, pops her head in to say goodbye as Bittle and an orderly are helping Jack into a wheelchair. “Now, you go home and take it easy,” she says. “Your sweet husband had cupcakes delivered to the entire staff, so don’t give him a hard time. For the next week or so, it’s his job to make sure you don’t overdo it.”

Jack smiles. Of course Bittle sent cupcakes to the hospital. He was probably up all night baking. It would explain why his side of the bed was cold when Jack woke up this morning. “I’m sure he’ll make sure I behave myself,” he replies.

She beams, as though he’s just said something incredibly charming. “I’m sure it won’t be long before you’re carrying him through the door like newlyweds.”

Bittle look like he can barely contain his laughter. When Jack asks him about it in the car, a shit-eating grin replaces his look of concentration as he navigates out of the parking garage.

“Do you remember anything about what you told the nurse?” Bittle asks.

“Um … Not really?”

“Well.” Jack can tell Bittle’s enjoying this by the way he’s drawing it out. “First, you kept asking if you were out of surgery. We kept telling you yes, but it was like you didn’t quite understand. Then you started flirting with me, and told Claudia we’ve only been together a few weeks.”

“Ha ha. That’s not exactly wrong.”

“Well, on your end I guess it’s true, but I wasn’t sure how to explain that to Claudia. At one point you told her you couldn’t wait to be all healed so you can throw me over your shoulder and carry me around. Which, incidentally, you did pretty frequently when we first got together.”

“I did?”

“Usually when I was editing vlogs instead of doing homework. Lord knows it would have been easier for you to just take my laptop away.”

“Did it work?”

“Well, it usually ended with us making out on the couch. And I earn a living talking about food on TV, not speaking French, so I’d say no. But your heart was in the right place.” Bittle pats Jack’s thigh. “By which I mean, your pants.”

“Ha ha.”

“Don’t worry, I didn’t tell Claudia that part. You changed the subject and started talking about hockey.”

“Figures.”

“You told us about the time you had to get stitches when you were nine. You never told me that before.”

“I was afraid,” Jack recalls, the sudden image of sterile white walls and a stern doctor flooding his memory. “On the way home we stopped at a mall and Maman bought me a book and ice cream for being brave.”

“Do we need to stop and get you a book and ice cream before we go home?” Bittle teases.

“We have books at home,” Jack says, remembering a few he’d seen on the shelf in the living room.

“Right. I keep forgetting it’s all new to you. Shopping from our own shelves, I like it. And we still have some of that ice cream. You probably aren’t hungry right now, though.”

“Not really. Mostly tired.”

“Of course you are. And probably sore, too. I’m going to make a real quick stop to pick up your pain meds, and then we’ll get you home to rest.”

At home, Bittle sets Jack set up on the couch and hands him his iPad so he can watch something, but the brief exertion has left him tired again. He sleeps heavily, waking to an awareness of a weight on his chest that wasn’t there before. “Papa,” Birdy whispers, handing him a raggedy cloth doll. “Feel better?”

Not to be outdone, Carter tucks his favorite wooden train into Jack's hand. “Daddy says you’re really tired and can’t have dinner.” Eyes darting to the clock on on the wall, Jack realizes he’s slept the afternoon away.

“I didn’t say Papa can’t have dinner,” Bittle says, bustling in from the kitchen, a pair of tongs in hand. “I said he can’t sit at the table with us tonight because he’s still tired and sore. We’ll make a little plate for Papa and he can eat dinner if he gets hungry. Do you want to help me make his plate?”

Carter seems satisfied with this arrangement. “Come on, Birdy. We have to let Papa rest.”

Birdy stubbornly shakes her head and makes no move to abandon her perch on Jack’s chest.

“She does this sometimes,” Bittle says. “A few months ago you went to a coaching clinic in Philly for three days, and when you got back she made you carry her everywhere for a week.”

“Leave her then,” Jack says. He suddenly remembers, with intensity, what it feels like to be small and miss a parent. Even just one night, when he was very young, felt like an eternity.

Bittle doesn’t argue, but snaps the tongs twice in Carter’s direction. “I need my kitchen helper.”

“Don’t let the alligator get me!” Carter shrieks, running to Bittle. On top of Jack, Birdy giggles.

“Help me feed the alligator some chicken tenders and he won’t get you,” Bittle chirps.

“Jesus, do we only eat chicken tenders in this house?” Jack wonders.

“Not if I can help it,” Bittle says with a shake of his head, “but I figured you deserve a treat when you’re feeling so lousy.”

“Ah. Thanks, Bittle.”

“Got your back, babe!” he replies brightly as he heads back into the kitchen. Jack hears more laughter as Bittle and Carter try to outdo each other making what he assumes are alligator noises. He sighs, suddenly aware of the pain in his knee.

“Papa hurt?” Birdy asks.

“A little.”

“I fix you,” she says, leaning toward him and kissing his cheek. “Better?”

Jack huffs out a laugh. “Yes, better.”

Birdy grins, satisfied, and lies down across Jack’s chest, tucking her head right under his chin. “Sleep, Papa,” she orders, closing her own eyes.

“Should she be taking a nap this late?” Jack wonders aloud. Nobody answers, so he closes his eyes, too.

 

At dusk, he’s awakened by the gentle pressure of a hand on his shoulder. He’s only slightly taken aback to see it’s Papa, not Bittle, by his side.

“Bitty took the kids to the park so they wouldn’t wake you,” Papa explains. “He said it’s time to give you these. Sounds like the surgery went well.”

Jack pulls himself into a semi-seated position and swallows the pills down with a swig of water in the glass Papa hands him. “Still hurts,” he finally grunts out.

Papa chuckles. “Just be grateful it’s only your knee. Could be worse.” He taps the side of his head.

The _or worse_ lingers, a reminder of the high cost of playing hockey at the highest levels. Papa, in his advanced age, seems to be faring better than many of his peers. “Think I got the genes for that?” 

“My hair and cheek bones worked out pretty well for you.”

“And your modesty, clearly.”

“Bitty said you need to do your exercises before they get back.”

“I see. He’s making you play the bad cop.”

“It could have been your mother.”

Jack grimaces. Alicia Zimmermann wielding a Xeroxed copy of a doctor’s recovery instructions is a fate he wouldn’t wish on anybody. He was only five when Papa had his shoulder surgery, but the memory of his parents cursing at each other in French, culminating in Papa breaking down in actual tears, is vivid. "Please, no."

“I wouldn’t do you dirty like that.”

“No, you’d just make me skate suicides until I can beat you,” Jack says, recalling the many times Papa made him stay on the ice long after his teammates had gone home. He’d thought it fun, at the time. Nobody else had a Stanley Cup-winning father as a personal coach. He wonders when it stopped being fun. Maybe around the time Papa stopped rewarding his wins with a dollar and a milkshake. Maybe when he realized he would always, in some way, be chasing his father.

“One step at a time. Let’s get you back in skates before I show you up.”

“Really, old man? You think you still have it at your age?”

“Hell no. I’m counting on it being a long recovery.”

Jack laughs. This is easy, nice even. Most of his recent interactions with Papa — recent in _his_ memory, anyway — have been fraught with tension, focused on Jack’s game and career prospects and the ever-shifting state of his mental health. It’s not quite as bad as it was Before, they still tiptoe around each other, but Jack knows that, if given the go-ahead, Papa would throw himself wholeheartedly into managing Jack’s future career.

Nobody wants that. Their family would never survive Jack’s Breakdown 2.0. It’s a relief, now, to know that never came to pass.

“I’m coming for you this winter,” Jack threatens.

“Work on beating your toddlers in skates, then we’ll talk. Exercises first.”

It’s an effort, but Jack completes the leg raises his doctor showed him while Papa watches, offering words of encouragement (“Get it, Jack!”) and wincing along with him. He’s just completed the set, sweaty and short of breath (seriously, how has he been reduced to this?) when Bittle and the kids burst through the door.

“Special delivery!” Bittle calls. He has Birdy propped up on one hip and a bouquet of flowers under his other arm. “These were on the porch. Looks like they’re from some of the kids you coach,” he says, setting the irises on the end table. “There’s a card.” He hands it to Jack, who reads the short, heartfelt messages from a bunch of kids he doesn’t know, but who clearly wish the best for him.

“Thank you for babysitting Jack,” Bittle tells Papa.

“You know it’s not babysitting when it’s your own child,” Papa retorts. The two crack up. It’s clearly some sort of inside joke. “I can stay and help you get the kids ready for bed,” he offers.

“Yesss!” Carter clasps his hands to his chest and bounces on his toes in a way that reminds Jack of Bittle. “Stay and read to us!”

“I appreciate the offer, but I’ve got it covered,” Bittle assures Papa. “I think we could all use a quiet night. Don’t forget to take that plate of cookies I left for you on the counter.”

“Why do you think I offered to come? Don’t tell Alicia; I don’t want to share.”

“Too late; she already texted and told me to tell you not to eat them all on the way home.”

“Yeah, she would,” Papa grumbles. He retrieves his goodies and calls goodbye to Jack on his way out the door. “Good work today, son.”

It’s the same way he congratulates Jack after a game, right down to the inflection. Jack isn’t sure if it’s habit, actual pride, or a little of both.

The kids wave to Papa and look disappointed to see him leave for all of two seconds before Bittle redirects them. “Tell Papa what you did at the park tonight,” he prods.

“Oh! I almost climbed to the top of the climbing wall! All by myself! No help!” Carter’s exuberant smile is an adorable, smaller version of Bittle’s.

“It was five more steps than last time,” Bittle says, for Jack’s benefit. “Just a little more work, and he’ll get to the top.”

“That’s great, bud.” Jack holds out a hand for a fist bump.

“I _know_!” Carter enthuses. “I did my best, like you and Daddy always tell me. Tomorrow, I’m gonna go to the top. I’m gonna do it!”

“Maybe wait until Papa’s better so he can see you do it, too.”

“No! You can take a picture of me. I’m gonna do it. When Papa’s better, I’ll do it super fast like Spiderman.”

“Super fast, huh? All right, Spiderman, time for your bath.” Bittle picks up Carter with his free arm and hauls the kids up the stairs, the three of them giggling all the way. Feeling more alert than he was earlier, and a little hungry for the first time all day, Jack turns on the TV and watches a bit of a police procedural set in space while he picks at the cold chicken tenders Bittle left for him earlier.

“I never could understand how you can eat those cold,” Bittle chirps, coming down stairs and sitting perpendicular to Jack on the other side of the sectional. He’s changed into pajama pants and an old SMH shirt so worn it’s practically see through. Jack quickly identifies it as his own by its loose fit; Bittle’s SMH shirts are a little tight through the chest. “Want me to warm them up?”

Jack shrugs. “They’re good.” He’s not picky, really.

Bittle snorts. “There’s this famous old recipe from some women’s magazine they called ‘engagement chicken,’ because so many women got proposed to after making it for their boyfriends.”

“Please don’t tell me I proposed after you made me chicken tenders.” Even Jack knows enough to find that horrifying.

Bittle smirks. “I could say yes and you’d believe me.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“You didn’t. Not that you wouldn’t have, given the chance, I’m sure. I just happened to beat you to the punch.”

Jack ponders this new information, decides it’s fair since he made the first move _and_ initiated their public coming out with that on-ice kiss. Based on Bittle’s own accounts, both were spontaneous events. Left to his own devices, he realizes, he might well _have_ proposed over a platter of chicken tenders.

“Kids in bed?” Jack asks.

“For the time being,” Bittle confirms with a sigh. “It’s been a long day.”

“They’ll sleep well,” Jack predicts. “It sounds like they wore themselves out at the park.”

“You should have seen Carter. He’s been working on that wall for months. He was so proud of himself tonight.”

“He did his best,” Jack says, repeating Carter’s words from earlier.

Bittle pokes his foot. “Kind of funny how doing their best is enough, isn’t it?”

Jack considers this as he contemplates the last chicken tender on the plate, thinks about the way Papa encouraged him through the simplest of leg lifts, the pride in his voice as he said goodbye. Maybe, he realizes, he doesn’t have to be the best to earn his father’s love and respect. Maybe where he’s at right now is enough. Maybe it’s always been enough. In the aftermath of everything, Papa insisted Jack's best was enough, but Jack never quite believed it.

Maybe if he gets back to Before, he’ll actually believe it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the LONG delay in getting this chapter out! It was never my intent to leave it hanging; the past month has been overwhelming on a personal level. Long story short, we're planning an interstate move and are trying to get our house ready to sell, researching new neighborhoods, and tying up other loose ends here. It's a lot. There were a few days last week where I was on my feet from 6 a.m. until after midnight. So I'm stealing moments to write when I can. As I wrap up the final chapters of this I can't promise updates will be as frequent as they were before, but I do hope I won't have to let another month go by between updates!


	9. Chapter 9

On a perfect summer afternoon in August, Jack Zimmermann — mentally 23 years of age, physically 44, and emotionally somewhere in between — reaches for the bespoke suit hanging in his closet. Hanging next to it is a Samwell hockey jersey, faded with age. He can’t resist taking it out for a closer look. He traces his finger over the the letters spelling out “Zimmermann” across the back. Some of the stitching is coming undone around the ‘Z’ and the first ‘M,’ and there’s a strange discolored spot along the hem. Still, it feels familiar.

“You gettin’ nostalgic on me? You always were more comfortable in a jersey and a pair of skates.” Bittle’s tender chirp catches Jack off guard; he fumbles with the jersey before carefully slotting it back in place between the suit and a sport coat.

“Seems weird to think I wore it just a few weeks ago.”

Fresh out of the shower, wearing only a towel around his waist, Bittle gives him a little half smile. “It’s okay to be a little sad about it, hon.”

Jack misses hockey the way he might miss an amputated limb, but there’s also some freedom in knowing the thing in his life that was the source of most of his anxiety is over. It’s over, it turned out okay — more than okay — and now, as proof of that, he’s going to a dinner where some important people in suits are going to give him award and ask him to give a speech.

“Yeah. I am sad, a little. But … it doesn’t hurt as much as I used to think it would.”

The warmth of Bittle’s hand on Jack’s arm is reassuring. “Sometimes life surprises you.”

So much about this life has surprised him. Like Bittle. Jack’s life has been all but plotted out from the day he was born; even with the wrong turns, there was still a plan and a goal.

And then Bittle came along, and upended all of that.

Before all of this, if somebody had asked him about the small freshman on his team, he would have recited facts: too small, too talkative, fast as hell but too timid for first line. He’d seen how his blunt criticism made Bittle’s face fall, but hadn’t realized how easily he could make him smile. Back then, during Bittle's first months at Samwell, their only contact had been on the ice, with inches of pads between them. Now, as Bittle’s fingers find the pressure points in Jack’s shoulders and begin to work at the tension there, he wonders how he could have settled for anything less than this easy intimacy.

Sometimes he wonders how long he can keep this up, _if_ he can keep this up, and then Bittle will wrap his arms around Jack from behind and rest his cheek against his back and hum with contentment and those doubts disappear.

“Much as I love this trip down memory lane, and would love nothing more than for you to put that on so I can take it off, I’ve been looking forward to seeing you in that suit again,” Bittle says.

“Watch it, or I won’t be able to stop thinking about that during dinner,” Jack cautions.

Bittle’s laughter is muffled, the little huff of breath on the back of Jack’s neck sending chills through his body. “Maybe that’s the idea.”

Yeah. There have definitely been some surprises.

“Time’s a tickin’,” Bittle murmurs, his lowered voice entirely at odds with the urgency of his words. “We really do need to get ready.”

Jack’s suit is hanging in the closet. His husband is by his side. Down the hall, their kids are getting dressed with the help of two neighbor girls.

“Then let’s do this.”

 

Red carpet events have never been Jack’s thing.

They are, very much, his parents’ thing. Back when Papa was playing in the 80s and 90s, before professional athletes were also trend setters and fashion icons, a red carpet might be the last place one would expect the NHL’s favorite bad boy to turn up. But Bad Bob Zimmermann, despite the image he cultivated on and off the ice early in his career, was surprisingly at home in Alicia Zimmermann’s world. He cleaned up nice, and loved the camera as much as it loved him.

They’d tried to keep Jack away from that part of their world, but some things couldn’t be avoided. He’s been to his share of events where he was forced to wear a suit and shake hands with strangers who know more about him than he does about them. It’s always been a part of his life, and for as long as he’s pursued a career in hockey he’s known it’s in his future.

That doesn’t mean it’s gotten easier.

“It’s just one night,” Bittle says in a low voice as they pull up to the valet. “A few pictures, one dinner, one speech, and then we can relax.”

That sounds good to Jack. Already his nerves are buzzing with … not anticipation, really. More like apprehension. Small talk has never been his forte, and now he’s about to enter a room full of people whose knowledge of his own life and career, however superficial, surpasses his own.

Dressed in a small blue suit — including a red bow tie that exactly matches Bittle’s — and a yellow party dress, respectively, Carter and Birdy look “red carpet-ready,” according to Bittle. They’re joining them for photographs before dinner, at which point their sitter will take them back to the hotel they’ll be staying at tonight.

Carter, like Jack, is most looking forward to dessert and the movie they’ve promised he can watch in the hotel room before bed. Birdy, on the other hand, begins twirling as soon as they exit the car. By the time they’re standing outside the ballroom, waiting to take pictures, she’s collected a small group of admirers who indulge her by complimenting her “fancy” dress and shoes.

Maman stands back with Jack, appraising her granddaughter, far more indulgent of Birdy’s behavior than she would have been when Jack was the same age.

“I look at her and think she’s you all over again,” Maman says as they watch Birdy, “but she certainly didn’t get your shyness.”

“I hope the anxiety skips over her too,” Jack says. The thought of his kids going through anything close to what he put himself through as a teenager scares the shit out of him. “I kind of fucked things up for myself for a bit.”

“She’s you with better parents,” Maman amends.

“You weren’t — you did your best,” Jack says around the lump in his throat.

He’d snapped at the kids yesterday, for being too noisy while he was trying to rest. Seeing their sad and shocked faces had led to his own spiraling. Bittle had found him in their bedroom, trying to breathe through a panic attack.

“Perfect parents don't exist,” Bittle had said as he rubbed small circles into Jack’s back. “Not mine. Not yours. Not even us, even though we try not to repeat their exact mistakes. And perfect kids don't, either.”

It’s easier, now, to accept his parents were just doing the best they could without the benefit of an instruction manual. And in the public eye, at that.

“Jack.” Bittle nudges him. “The photographer wants a minute.”

Jack poses for a series of photographs, alone and then with Bittle and the kids. Bittle and Birdy light up in front of the camera, turning on the charm and delighting the photographers. Carter, much like Jack would have at the same age, gamely poses next to his sister but looks pensive.

“Hey, bud.” Jack hoists his son onto his hip. “I think I saw a chicken over there.” It’s an old game Papa used to play with him to get him to smile in situations like this.

“No! You didn’t see a chicken.”

“Yeah, she ran right into the crowd. I think she was wearing a fur coat.”

“That’s not … chickens don’t wear fur coats,” Carter insists, giggling at the absurdity.

“That’s it. That’s the shot,” the photographer tells them, snapping a few more for good measure. “Adorable kids.”

“Thank you,” Bittle says. “We sure do think so.”

“Do they skate like you?” a reporter calls out.

“Ah, Carter started lessons last winter,” Jack answers. “We plan to get Birdy in skates this winter, if she feels ready.”

“Jack needs to get all healed up from his surgery first,” Bittle adds.

“They might not want to play hockey, and that’s okay.” For some reason, Jack thinks it’s important he make that clear.

In the hour before dinner, the memory of how to do this — the photos, the compliments, the perfunctory greetings — rushes back to him.There are more photo ops, of Jack and the other honorees together and with the mayor. He’s asked as many questions about his parents and Bittle as he is about himself, and somehow those feel easier to field. Jack shakes hands with dozens of people he thinks he should know. He’s helped by Bittle, who charmingly greets each by name and with a personal anecdote about the last time they saw each other.

“Thanks, Bittle,” Jack says during a quiet moment.

“No problem, Sweetpea. I’m used to it.” Bittle’s tone is fond.

“Figures.” Once, Jack heard somebody say you can run from your parents, but you’ll end up marrying them anyway. Gregarious, effervescent Bittle, who doesn’t mind crowds and speaks for Jack when Jack can’t speak for himself, shares those traits with the elder Zimmermanns.

By the time their dinner plates are being cleared, a photo of Jack and Carter laughing together about chickens in formalwear is making the Twitter rounds. Bittle surreptitiously hands his phone to Jack under the table so he can read some of the replies:

 

 **BlueEyedBaker:** @jlz01 is #dadgoals

 **AnnH:** First @jlz01 sighting in what seems like months and it’s this?! There goes my heart. Well done.

 **icing:** omg, that kid looks just like Eric Bittle.

 **Cara_Hallowell:** @icing, that’s b/c @omgcheckplease Eric Bittle is his other dad.

 **icing:** @Cara_Hallowell: I know, but they hardly ever let their kids be photographed in public and it's been ages since Eric posted a personal photo. Wonder if the girl looks like Zimmermann.

 **BostonStringer:** @icing @Cara_Hallowell I’m here at this event and can confirm the girl looks just like Jack Zimmermann. Both kids are adorable.

 

“At least they’re being nice about them,” Jack whispers, even though the focus on their kids feels a bit unsettling.

Bittle pats his knee. “I think most people who follow us closely know how we feel about the media and our kids. It’s not like when you were growing up.”

Jack hands the phone over to Bittle as the mayor takes the stage for some opening remarks, and to acknowledge the night’s three honorees before each is introduced by another member of the community. Jack’s fellow award recipients — a seven-year old who established a non-profit to pair kids in foster care with “grandparents” in retirement communities, and a local actress who runs a theater arts program for incarcerated teens — receive their recognitions and give their own speeches before it’s Jack’s turn.

Jack knows he’ll be introduced by Mackenzie Vang, one of the kids going to Samwell thanks to the scholarship he established. He'd had a chance to meet Mackenzie and Trevor Lerner, the other Zimmermann Scholarship recipient, before dinner and they'd seemed like sweet kids. Mackenzie looks a bit hesitant as she takes the stage, then breaks the ice by making a joke about being more accustomed to moving in hockey skates rather than heels.

Jack can see Mackenzie relax a little as she looks down at her notes, takes a deep breath, hesitates, and finally looks out at the audience.

“I, um, I was a figure skater when I was a little girl, up until I was about 12 years old,” she begins. “That’s when my dad was diagnosed with cancer. I have three older sisters, and after he passed away there just wasn’t a lot of money for extras like skating lessons and new equipment. A few years ago, the leadership team at my high school went on a team building trip to the local ice rink and I saw a sign on the boards advertising free hockey lessons through the Zimmermann Foundation. It wasn’t figure skating, but I missed the ice _so_ much, and it was free. So my friend Rachel and I went to the first lesson. We were the only girls to show up. I thought I would be awful because I’d never worn hockey skates before, but Coach Jack saw something special in me. He told me that one of the best guys he’d ever played with was a figure skater who didn’t start playing hockey until high school, and he ended up getting a scholarship to play at Samwell University. I later found out he was talking about his husband, Coach Eric”— Mackenzie looks directly at Bittle and gives a shy little wave. “After that, getting a scholarship to play hockey in college became my goal.

“Coach Jack introduced me to Coach Eric, who worked with me once a week to show me how to use my figure skating background to my advantage. He didn’t have to do that, it wasn’t part of the clinic, but he did it because he believed in me. When the session was over, the Zimmermann Foundation paid my fees so I could join a local hockey club. That’s how it started. I ended up making the varsity team at my school my sophomore year, all thanks to the coaching and playing experience I got from the Zimmermann Foundation. And it wasn’t just help on the ice. Coach Jack knew I was still sad and angry about my dad’s death, and he asked if I’d ever been to therapy. My mom’s insurance doesn’t cover mental health expenses, so my sisters and I only went once or twice right after Dad died. The Zimmermann Foundation paid for me to see a therapist, which has really helped me process everything.”

Jack glances at Bittle, who finds his hand under the table and gives it a little squeeze as if to say, _Yes, you did that_.

“When the time came to apply to colleges,” Mackenzie continues, “Coach Jack talked to me about continuing to play. I thought I might apply to state schools. Even with scholarships, college is expensive, and a lot of nearby schools have teams. But he told me about the Zimmermann Scholarship he was establishing at Samwell and encouraged me to apply there as well. My friend Trevor and I both applied, and we both got scholarships. We’ll be starting our freshman year as Wellies later this month. Coach Jack has already said he’ll be at our first games —”

The spontaneous applause that drowns out Mackenzie’s next words is the loudest of the evening by far.

“My life is completely different because of the Zimmermann Foundation. It’s given me a place to learn and grow and even grieve. It’s helped me learn about who I am. I don’t think I’ll play professionally after college, but I’ve been helping coach a peewee team and I really like it. I think I want to work with kids someday, maybe as coach or even a therapist, and I wouldn’t know that if Coach Jack hadn’t given me a chance to play…”

Overwhelmed. That’s how Jack feels right now. It’s one thing to read about his accomplishments, or to hear about them from Bittle. It’s another to be confronted with somebody whose life has been changed in radical ways because of him. He misses the last bit of Mackenzie’s speech, doesn’t realize he’s missed his cue to take the stage until he feels Bittle’s hand on his arm, helping him to his feet.

Bittle gives him one quick kiss on the cheek before he slowly gets up and makes his way to the podium, his pace hindered by his still-healing knee. When he looks out at the crowd, all eyes are on him. He pulls the note cards Bittle helped him prepare from his inner jacket pocket. 

“Um ... I’m not much for speeches, but my husband told me I have to prepare one,” Jack reads from the first card. He pauses for the polite laughter and catches Bittle’s eye. “My husband and my parents are the talkers in the family. I’ve always been more comfortable on the ice than on stage. But I’ve seen a lot of wine being poured tonight, so hopefully you’ll all remember me as more charming than I actually am.” More laughter.

“First of all, I'd like to thank Mayor Greenberg and the selection committee for this recognition. I'm just an old hockey player, and I never expected my retirement would look like this. Because I’ve always been more comfortable with the physical parts of my job, I wasn’t sure where I would land after I retired. My father turned to commentating in his retirement, but I knew that wasn’t for me. My business manager floated the idea of buying a hockey team. But owning a team just for the sake of owning it didn’t appeal to me. Neither did management. Instead, I became a stay-at-home dad, went back to school, and fell into youth coaching."

According to Bittle, the coaching had been part of the adjustment period, post-retirement. As happy as Jack had been to leave roadies and early morning conditioning behind, Bittle told him, he'd been antsy and irritable away from the ice. It was Bittle who had handed him his skates one evening and suggested he check out the youth practice that was going on at his old practice rink.

“One of the things I’ve noticed over a lifetime in hockey," Jack continues, "is something I’ve always known on some level: Hockey can be pretty exclusive. The kids who have the most money and support have the most opportunities. I grew up pretty insulated from the reality that, for many young athletes, hockey ends when parents can’t keep up with the expenses. It wasn’t until I got to college and had the opportunity to play with great guys who were there on scholarship that I realized it’s not that easy for everybody.

“When I was coaching that first youth team after I retired, I met Adam. Adam was a 15-year-old goalie who did odd jobs around the rink to earn money to pay his club fees. That’s when I got the idea for Zimmermann Foundation. If we could pay the fees for kids like Adam, then they could spend their time playing hockey instead of working to play hockey. I talked to my husband and my parents, and they agreed that it was a good idea. So that’s how it started. Now, as Mackenzie noted, we run free introduction to hockey clinics and offer financial aid to young players with financial difficulties. But I have to say, my proudest moment was being able to award Mackenzie and Trevor with the first Zimmermann Foundation scholarships to attend my alma mater, Samwell University. They’ll be able to attend the university and play hockey without having to work or take out loans. Samwell changed my life in so many ways. It became my home. I hope that the Zimmermann Scholarship will help these kids find a home there, too. Thank you.”

The applause and camera flashes are a little disorienting, so Jack looks to Bittle and his parents as a focal point. They’re all beaming, tears in their eyes. It’s nice to see them crying happy tears, instead of tears of frustration or disappointment or — in Bittle’s case — fear. Bittle’s smile is stretched from ear to ear, and Jack can’t remember the last time Papa looked this proud. It’s a wholly unnatural feeling, to be recognized for something he still doesn’t feel he wholly deserves, but it also feels good.

It feels really good.

 

*

 

The kids are asleep in one of the two double beds when they make it up to their hotel suite after one last drink and prolonged goodbyes with Jack’s parents. It’s not even ten, but Jack’s exhausted. Judging by the way Bittle is clinging to Jack’s arm and leaning on him for support, Bittle is feeling the effects of the long day (or the wine) as well.

Bittle pays Annie, one of the neighbor girls who helped them get the kids ready earlier, and orders a car to take her home — all via apps on his phone — and hands her a goodie bag from the reception. He waits until the door has clicked shut and the lock has been slid into place before pouncing, backing Jack against the door in a familiar move.

“Is _that_ what you got out of checking practice?”

“Don’t have much of a chance to put it to practice on the ice anymore,” Bittle says, matter-of-fact. “Might as well put it to use on my big hunk of a husband.”

Jack offers up silent thanks to his younger self for having the foresight to teach Bittle that move, even if that wasn’t its intended purpose.

Bittle rises on his toes and catches Jack’s lips in a sweet, sweet kiss. They lazily make out for a little while before Jack interrupts things with a yawn.

Bittle laughs, sharp and sweet. “Yeah, I’m feeling it too. Maybe we should just turn in early. Not like we can get up to much with the kids in the next bed over.” He tangles Jack’s hand loosely in his and leads him to the bathroom, where they exchange a few more kisses before shedding their suits and changing into comfort clothes. Jack scrubs his face with the hotel-issued soap while Bittle squints at himself in the mirror. It’s been weeks, and Jack still isn’t sure what Bittle’s pre-bedtime routine involves that it takes so much longer than his own; he asked him once and Bittle had chuckled a little and said something about “preserving the mystery.”Jack isn’t sure if Bittle really does want to make his efforts to stave off aging seem effortless, or if he just doesn’t want Jack to know how much money he spends on said efforts. Jack suspects it’s a bit of both.

When Bittle comes out of the bathroom wearing his familiar old Samwell shirt and smelling like whatever blend of concoctions he puts on his face at night, something inside Jack settles.

“You look like a snack, Bittle,” Jack says as Bittle slides into bed next to him.

Bittle snorts his dissent and digs his big toe into Jack’s calf.

“Ouch, what was that for? Did I use that wrong?”

“ _Stop_. I think I _ate_ too many snacks tonight. Gosh, those mini tarts they brought around after dinner were good.” Bittle sighs. “Clean eating begins tomorrow.”

“ _Snack_ ,” Jack insists, nuzzling in the junction between Bittle’s neck and shoulder.

“Dack?” Birdy bolts upright in the bed next to them and rubs at her eyes.

“Not right now, Birdy Girl,” Bittle tells her. “It’s time to sleep.”

“Okay.” Birdy lies down and snuggles a little closer to her brother. By the time Bittle’s taken a quick picture of the two, she’s out cold.

Bittle props himself up next to Jack and leans into him. “Shitty texted,” he says, pointing at the message on his phone. “Said he’s sorry he couldn’t be there tonight, but Lardo’s brother, unlike his father, only gets married once.”

Jack snorts.

“He also asked how your knee is doing, and wants me to tell you knows a place in the city that will deliver ‘motherfuckin’ magic brownies’ if you want to take some of the edge off the pain.”

“Of course he does.”

Bittle raises an eyebrow. “It’s still kinda early. You wanna?”

“What was that you were just saying about clean eating?” Jack asks, digging a finger into the ticklish spot in the middle of Bittle’s ribs.

“I said _tomorrow_ ,” Bittle gasps as he rolls away to put some distance between himself and Jack’s fingers. “Tomorrow’s still a couple hours away.”

Jack glances over at the kids asleep in the bed next to theirs. “Would it be terrible of me to say I would, if they weren’t here?” It’s not something he indulges in often, but right now it sounds kind of perfect.

“Shoot, honey, I would too.” Bittle says, snuggling closer now that the imminent threat of being ticked has passed.

“Tonight was just a lot.”

“Tonight _was_ a lot,” Bittle agrees. “Used to be that our night would just be be getting started at this hour. Now we’re a couple of old dads, in bed by ten-thirty. Lord, if you’d told me at that first Cup party that this was in our future, I’d have been so disappointed in us.”

“I wouldn’t have,” Jack says.

“Yeah, well, you’ve always been an old dad,” Bittle says fondly. “Now your outside just matches your inside.”

“Is that a chirp?”

“Just stating the facts,” Bittle says, tangling his fingers in Jack’s chest hair and giving it a playful tug.

The creaky air conditioner starts up, drowning out the soft sounds of the kids’ breathing. Bittle shivers and curls into Jack’s side. “You did good tonight,” he says into Jack’s shoulder.

“Yeah?”

“I am so proud to be your husband, Jack Zimmermann. You’re a good man.”

Jack doesn’t reply to that, just rests his chin on top of Bittle’s head and relaxes, finally allowing the weight of this evening, the past month, maybe the past five years, to slide off of him. 

Bittle yawns. “I could really go for some pancakes tomorrow morning. You up for a drive to that one place? Maybe we can take the kids to the beach afterward.”

“Sounds good,” Jack says, already thinking about Birdy’s happy smile whenever they sit down to eat together, and Carter's earnest attempts at cutting his own pancakes. “We should stop home and get Daisy, though. She’d like the water.”

“Of course,” Bittle agrees. “We’ll get the kids’ beach toys, too.”

They’re still making plans for tomorrow, and the rest of the week, when the phone on Bittle’s side of the bed vibrates with a new text message. Bittle checks it and smiles, handing it over so Jack can see.

He squints against the bright light, letting his eyes adjust so he can read the message and see the attached picture from Shitty: “Fuck, you two still make every other couple look like they just kind of like each other. Can’t believe this is what two decades of love looks like on you.”

The picture is one that was taken earlier in the evening, as the photographer was trying to pose everyone. Jack is holding a squirming Birdy and Bittle’s got Carter in his arms. None of them are looking at the camera but Jack and Bittle are looking at each other, smiling at some private joke he no longer remembers. They look older than the Samwell versions of themselves Jack still pictures in his head, but they also look happier. They look like they're in love.

Every version of Jack Zimmermann, he suspects, loves every version of Eric Bittle. Jack says it now, because Bittle should know how much he loves him right now. “Bits,” he whispers, setting the phone on Bittle’s chest. “I love you.”

“Oh, honey.” Bittle rolls closer, rests his cool hand on Jack’s chest. “I love you, too.”

Jack still isn’t entirely sure how he got here, but he knows he’s never belonged anywhere more.


	10. Chapter 10

Something is wrong.

Jack’s bed is too small, the air in the room too … stale. It’s heavy and tinged with something sour, like his old room at the Haus.

When he tries to stretch his foot makes contact with the bunched up top sheet, which has somehow twisted and migrated to the foot of the bed. A pair of strong arms wraps around him and pins him to the mattress.

“Watch my knee,” he grunts, still not sure if he’s actually awake.

“You’re dreaming, brah.” Shitty’s voice cuts into Jack’s consciousness and pulls him out from whatever semi-awake state he was in.

“Shits?”

Shitty jostles Jack’s shoulder, nearly knocking him off the bed. “Who were you expecting? You came home alone last night and went straight to bed.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Sleeping.”

“Why aren’t you in your own bed?”

“Two of the frogs are in my bed,” Shitty replies, as though that explains everything. It explains nothing, but Shitty’s mention of frogs triggers something that’s been tickling at the edge’s of Jack’s awareness.

“Bittle?” Jack doesn’t remember seeing him after they parted ways last night, but he can’t shake the feeling that Bittle was _here_. With him. In this bed. If he closes his eyes he can almost remember the warmth of Bittle’s body pressed up against his, Bittle’s hands on …

 _Fuck_. Did Jack have a sex dream about Bittle?

“Nah, not Bittle. What a beaut of a goal, huh? Didn’t see him after the game, either. Thought he might stop by to celebrate.”

Something twists in Jack’s gut at that, knowing he’s probably to blame for Bittle’s absence last night. “Yeah,” he mumbles, worming his way out of Shitty’s embrace, still feeling unsettled. His memory of snapping at Bittle last night is crystal clear, but there’s also something else there that makes Jack doubt that was their last interaction.

“You sure I came straight upstairs last night? I didn’t drink?” It’s not that Jack doesn’t trust Shitty, but it wasn’t that long ago that too many mornings began this way, with Jack not quite remembering what happened the night before.

“I tried, man, but you weren’t exactly in the best mood.”

Well, that at least lines up with Jack’s memory. Whatever it is he _thinks_ he might be remembering, it was only a dream. “I have to run. You coming?”

“It’s Sunday,” Shitty whines. “Come back to bed, lover.”

“You wish.” Jack is already sitting on the edge of his bed, tugging on his socks. “I’ll be back in a few.” He's reaching for his shoes when Shitty knees him in the ass, sending him tumbling off the bed. He lands with a _thump_ that reverberates through the Haus. 

“Asshole,” Jack mumbles. He lies on the floor for a minute, contemplating the ceiling and taking inventory of his body. Everything feels the way it should; the usual aches and pains from last night’s game fading into dull, almost pleasant, memories. Nothing out of the ordinary, which is almost a surprise. He pokes at his left knee, expecting at least a bruise, something to prove whatever he’s remembering is real and not just a dream he’s already forgetting, but there’s nothing. There shouldn’t be. He’s never hurt his knee. “You sure you aren’t coming?” he asks, picking himself up.

Shitty cackles. “Brah. Let me sleep.”

Jack throws a pair of dirty basketball shorts at Shitty’s head as he leaves.

 

Jack usually finds solace in his running routine. He never deviates from the three-mile route he worked out early last year when he moved into the Haus, and he can time it almost down to the second. The guys have jokingly used it as “evidence” in support of their theory that he’s a hockey robot, but the truth is it’s one less thing he has to think about this early in the morning. He gets up, he gets dressed, he puts one foot in front of the other for three miles.

He’s in the kitchen mixing his protein shake when his phone buzzes with a text from Papa: “Still on for breakfast?”

He gives his tumbler one last shake before typing out the reply. “Sure.”

“Great!” comes Papa’s reply, almost too quickly. “We’re meeting the Bittles at Jerry’s in a half hour. Do you know where that is? You can swing by Eric’s dorm and pick him up on your way over.”

 _Crisse_. Of course it would be Bittle. After their tense conversation following last night’s game — not to mention whatever he and Bittle were doing in his dreams last night — breakfast with him is the last thing Jack wants to endure. “Fine,” he types, before downing his shake. He’ll have to shower quickly if he’s going to make it across campus to grab Bittle before breakfast.

Standing outside Bittle’s suite, it becomes apparent that nobody bothered to inform Bittle of this morning’s plans. A annoyed-looking kid opens the door and smirks a little before wordlessly letting Jack in and returning to his room, slamming the door behind him.

Bittle, sleep-mussed and hair askew, looks about as happy to see Jack as Jack is to be here. But when he raises his head to meet Jack’s eyes there’s a flicker of … something … that sends an electric current straight through Jack and, oddly, puts him at ease. Bittle’s eyes are … familiar.

Well, more familiar than they should be. It’s not like Jack has spent a lot of time staring into Bittle’s eyes but, at the same time, it feels like he’s spent quite a bit of time staring into those eyes. An eerie feeling washes over Jack. Is this what déjà vu feels like?

“Why are you here?” Bittle demands, his icy tone at odds with that brief warm feeling Jack had seconds ago.

And okay, maybe Jack deserves it, a little bit, after the way he left things last night.

Jack stammers out an explanation about breakfast and Bittle reacts with what, for him, amounts to hostility. “I need to get dressed,” he snaps.

So this is how it's going to be, same as it ever was. Fine. Jack can work with that. “I can wait and we can walk over together,” Jack insists, matching Bittle’s tone.

“I need to get dressed,” Bittle says again, terse and wary.

“I can wait,” Jack repeats, shouldering past him into the room. Bittle lets out a little panicked gasp.

“What?” Jack asks. Bittle doesn’t look well.

“Nothing,” Bittle says. His brows knit together and for a split second Jack has an image of an older Bittle with this exact expression. “Did I dream about you?”

Jack’s heart lurches in his chest. _Crisse_. Maybe this weird energy he’s been feeling all morning is affecting Bittle, too. Maybe it was a shared sex dream. Is that a thing? “Did you?” he asks, being careful to not give himself away.

“Nothin’. Never mind,” Bittle says, shimmying into his skinny jeans in a way that makes Jack look away.

“Are you okay, Bittle?” he asks the Beyoncé poster on the opposite wall. “You look like you’re coming down with something.”

“Just tired,” Bittle says, voice soft and resigned.

“You should get to bed earlier,” Jack can’t help but lecture. “Between the season and finals coming up, you’ll need to be at the top of your game. We can’t afford to lose players to illness. Try to sub some green smoothies for those pumpkin spice lattes.” The freshman plague is a real thing at Samwell, brought on by lack of sleep, poor diets, and too much partying; the last thing Jack needs is for Bittle to get sick and take the entire team down like dominoes.

Bittle doesn’t respond to that, just continues to tie his shoes. They notice the puck lying next to Bittle’s Chuck Taylor at the same time.

The unsettled feeling returns with full force when Bittle picks it up and presents it to him, confused. It’s the puck from last night’s game, and Jack is pretty sure he had it with him when he got back to the Haus last night. He shrugs it off, like all of the other mysteries of this morning. Bittle starts to set it down but seems to think better of it and tucks it into his hoodie pocket instead.

They don’t talk much on the way to Jerry’s. There’s a hint of winter in the air, a chill that wasn’t present even last week; Bittle pulls his hands into the sleeves his hoodie and shivers a little. Jack chirps him for this and Bittle responds in kind. It would be so easy to ride this easy feeling to wherever it takes them, but something stops Jack from going any further. Bittle isn’t comfortable with him, that much is clear from his body language and uncharacteristic silence.

When Johnson shows up walking in the opposite direction, Jack almost isn’t surprised. The guy is a hell of a goalie buthe’s strange, and not in the way Shitty’s strange. It took Jack a little while to learn that conversations with Johnson tend to be a series of metaphors peppered with enlightened-sounding sentiments that nobody really understands. As frogs, Shitty kept a running list of some of his more unusual proclamations, but there was no rhyme or reason to them and at some point it just didn’t seem funny anymore.

“Oh, hey, you got it!” Johnson says, pointing out the puck Bittle has been absentmindedly playing with as they walk. “The game winner.”

Bittle hands it to Johnson. “We think it is. I found it in my room this morning.”

“Glad it found its way back to you. I thought it got lost. Or maybe it didn’t Sometimes it’s really hard to keep the timelines straight, you feel me?”

“No,” Jack and Bittle say together.

“I found it on the kitchen counter. Figured Jack set it there while he was making his protein shake. I thought I’d take it before it gets lost. Since it really belongs to Bitty here.”

“I was going to give it to Bittle,” Jack mumbles, a little chastened.

“Did you bring it by last night?” Bittle asks Johnson.

Johnson looks off at some invisible point in the distance. “Yeah,” he finally says. “That sounds right. Oh, hey, I have to get to the library. Have fun at breakfast. Your kids are gonna love that story.”

“Sure, Johnson,” Jack says.

“Do you get it now, Bitty?" Johnson asks, already on his way to wherever he's going. "Remember, you’re where you need to be!” 

“Is the library even open this early?” Bittle asks. Whatever color was in his cheeks due to their brisk walk has faded; he looks like he's seen a ghost. “And how’d he know we’re going to breakfast?”

Jack shrugs. “It’s Johnson. At some point we all just stopped questioning.”

The restaurant is just up ahead; Jack spots Papa’s rental car in the parking lot and picks up the pace. Papa is just above Bittle on the list of people Jack would prefer not to see, but when he spots them enter he restaurant he smiles brightly and waves, and there’s no judgement in his eyes, only happiness. Suzanne Bittle also looks overly enthusiastic about this breakfast. She’s nice enough though, outgoing and effusive just like her son. 

Bittle doesn’t seem to have a problem chatting away with his mother and Papa; it’s only Jack he seems to have a problem with. Jack allows the three social butterflies to carry the conversation while he studies the menu, even though he always orders eggs and sausage. He declines Papa’s offer to share an order of cinnamon roll pancakes and sighs internally when Bittle — almost spitefully, it seems — orders the whoopee pie and a sugary coffee drink. When his own eggs arrive he scrapes half of them onto Bittle’s plate, wondering who’s going to look out for him when Jack graduates and isn’t here to prevent him from eating junk food for breakfast every morning.

Jack eats silently, following the conversation about cookies and baking methods and Bittle’s short-lived time as a football player. “Dicky’s always been more at home on the ice,” Suzanne Bittle says proudly, and Jack has to agree: Bittle may not be able to take a check but, under duress, Jack would admit he’s one of the most skilled skaters he’s ever met.

“Nice people,” Papa says after they’ve said goodbye to the Bittles and are on their way back to the Haus in Papa’s rental. “What would you think about Hall and Murray putting you on the same line?”

Jack shrugs. Papa has mentioned the possibility several times, and Jack just doesn’t see it working out. Sure, Bittle’s fast. But he can’t execute the type of plays they need to win. Not yet, anyway.

“I know that look,” Papa continues. “What’s your concern?”

Jack looks at his lap and shakes his head. “I just don’t think it can work. He still can’t take a check. And I don’t even know if he really wants to be here.”

“Maybe it’s not about Bitty wanting to be here. Maybe he needs to feel like you _want_ him here,” Papa says sagely. “I got traded a few times in my career, and every time, it took me a little while to find my footing with the new team. Anyway, you didn’t exactly fit right in when you got here.” He parks on the street in front of the Haus and turns off the car, but doesn’t get out.

It rankles Jack that Papa was so easily able to get to the heart of the problem he’s been wrestling with for weeks. His first months at Samwell weren’t easy either. It was immediately obvious he could play, and it didn’t take long for his coaches to put him on the first line, but it took him longer to find his footing with the team. Everybody knew — or thought they knew — the sad, depraved story of Jack Zimmermann, The Boy Who Fucked Up The Draft. A lot of his teammates resented him for coming in and stealing the spotlight. A few kept their distance, as though his addictions were contagious. Only Shitty had welcomed him without judgement or reservation.

Things were better last year, when the seniors from Jack’s frog year graduated and a new group of frogs came in. With a year of playing and no screwups under his belt, the remaining guys — especially those in the Haus — began to see him as their peer and, eventually, a friend.

So yeah, the fact that it took Jack almost two years to make friends, when all Bittle had to do was show up with a few pies, is a little galling.

But it hasn’t been that easy for Bittle. Jack knows this. It’s why he started the checking practice in the first place. Well, sort of. He’d be lying if it didn’t also have a little bit to do with the fact that, increasingly, important people are watching their games to see Jack, and he needs to be able to count on his teammates.

“He’s a good kid,” Papa continues when Jack doesn’t say anything. “I really think the two of you could build something good together.”

Papa can be overbearing sometimes, but he isn’t often wrong. Not when it comes to hockey. Not when it comes to sizing players up and figuring out where their strengths lie. 

“He needs more practice,” Jack says.

“Then help him. And get that cookie recipe. I know your mother would love it.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Jack allows Papa to hug him goodbye and promises to call later in the week. He stands in the front yard as the rental car’s taillights fade from view, feeling relieved this weekend is over and grateful it wasn’t worse.

Jack grabs a bottle of water from the fridge on the way up to his room. Johnson is in the kitchen, looking at Jack with what can only be described as smug satisfaction. “Did you figure it out?” he asks. Jack looks around, but he’s the only other person in the room; Johnson can’t possibly be addressing anybody else.

“Did I figure what out?”

“Bitty. Are you good?”

Jack recalls Bittle’s eyes and how, for the briefest of moments, looking into them had made him feel calm and centered. Maybe it's nothing, but maybe Papa is right — maybe he does need Bittle on his line. Maybe they can build something good.

He thinks about Bittle’s eyes, and the recipe Papa wants him to get. He thinks he may be able to make this right. He may have an opening.

“Yeah, I think I did,” Jack says, pulling out his phone and composing a text. _Bittle: My dad wants your cookie recipe. Maybe you can come by the Haus sometime and show me how to make them._

It’s small, but it’s an opening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it! But also not it. Though this is the last official chapter of this fic, I'll be posting the epilogue later this week.


	11. Epilogue

2034

 

It’s still dark when Jack wakes, which is normal. Getting up before the sun was all he knew for years when he was playing, and fatherhood hasn’t exactly changed that, even if he wishes the kids would occasionally — _once in a while_ — sleep past dawn. His head feels a little achy though, like he might be dehydrated or coming down with something. He reaches for the water bottle on his nightstand and takes a large swig before burrowing back into his pillow.It won’t hurt to sleep in a little. Bitty will get up with the kids.

When Jack wakes again, it’s to somebody climbing into bed next to him and snuggling close. He opens his eyes. The room is bathed in sunlight now, and his husband’s hand is on his waist, poking at the ticklish spot just above his hip.

“This is how you wake me on my birthday?” Jack huffs, voice gravelly with sleep.

Bitty snuggles closer. His hand finds Jack’s hip again and moves around to give his ass a little squeeze. “You’re right. You deserve to relax on your big day.” His hand creeps lower, toward Jack’s inner thigh, and …

“Where are the kids?” Jack asks, remembering the last time they got interrupted trying to do this.

“I put Daniel Tiger on for Carter. Birdy’s still in bed.”

“So we have about 20 minutes —” Jack is cut off by a crash and a cry from somewhere down the hall.

Bitty frowns a little. “Or not,” he says wryly. “You stay put, I’ll deal with it. We can pick up where we left off after your parents leave tonight.” Bitty gives him a positively _dirty_ smirk and it’s all Jack can do not to scream in frustration as he Bitty rolls out of bed and pulls a pair of gray joggers over his boxer briefs (Jack is _definitely_ looking at his ass) before exiting the room. He hears muffled voices, and kitchen sounds, and then the sound of footsteps and giggling as the bedroom door cracks open.

“Surprise!”

Jack braces himself and feigns surprise as the kids burst in and bound onto the bed, pinning him down. “Oof,” Jack gasps, playing it up for them. “You’re getting too strong, guys.” With exaggerated effort, he rolls over just enough to send them sliding off of his stomach and onto the mattress. Their delighted giggles fill the room.

Bitty’s standing in the doorway, grinning and holding a tray piled high with breakfast: eggs, muffins, and a bowl of fruit. “It’s someone’s special day today. Is there anything you’d like to say to Papa this morning?” he prompts.

“Papa! Happy birthday!” Carter shrieks.

“Papa birfday!” Birdy parrots.

Jack lets himself go boneless as the kids scramble back onto him and shower him with hugs and kisses.

“All right, you two, let Papa breathe,” Bitty says through laughter. “Carter, would you like to help me serve breakfast?” He winks at Jack. “ _Someone_ was so tried after his big party last night he didn’t even notice we got up early to bake.”

Carter scrambles off the bed and runs toward Bitty, who hands him a muffin. He races back to Jack and climbs onto the bed, more carefully this time. “We made these, Papa. Cherry chocolate chip. Your favorite.”

Jack smiles in appreciation. He never thought he was a cherry person, or a chocolate person, until Bitty. But then, he didn’t think of himself as a lot of things until Bitty.

“My muffin,” Birdy says. She rolls over onto her back and bats blue eyes, so like his own, up at Jack.

“Yours is right here, sweetie pie,” Bitty says, crossing the room and setting his tray at the foot of the bed before coming around and sliding back into bed next to Jack. “Carter, hon, sit right here,” he suggests, making a space between himself and Jack. Carter climbs over Jack and Birdy and settles into the spot. Meanwhile, Birdy does her best to navigate the now-crowded bed to find a spot in his lap. “Papa,” she sighs, resting her head on his chest and looking up at him.

Bittle leans forward and picks three more muffins off of the tray. “See, there’s enough for everyone,” he says as he hands one to each of the children. Immediately, Jack is covered in crumbs as Birdy shifts a little and crushes her muffin against his chest.

“You got up early to make these?” Jack asks as the kids eat. “Must be hard with a hangover,” he chirps. They went out with Shitty and Lardo and a few other friends last night, and a few bottles of wine may have been consumed at dinner before they returned home and Shitty had the bright idea to recreate tub juice with the contents of their liquor cabinet.

Bitty smiles a little wanly. “Would’ve been up with them anyway. I’m definitely regretting some of my choices last night, though. Lord, Jack, we are way too old for this.”

“ _I_ am, anyway,” Jack agrees. “Old and broken and —”

Bittle shoves him lightly. “You stop that, Jack Zimmermann. It’s just a little knee injury, and you know you’re gonna feel so much better after your surgery. Papa’s so silly, isn’t he?” he adds for the benefit of the kids, Jack knows. “How old is Papa today?”

Carter giggles. “Forty-four!” he shrieks, waving his muffin in the air. Crumbs rain down onto the bed.

“Four!” Birdy says.

“No, Birdy, _forty_ -four,” Carter says in exasperation. His little indignant frown is so like Bitty’s that Jack can’t help but chuckle. “Daddy, she keeps saying —”

“I know, Carter,” Bitty says patiently. “Your sister’s little, she’s still learning. Birdy, hon, Carter is four. Papa’s _forty_ -four today.” Bitty primly takes a bite of his own muffin.

Carter sets his muffin in his lap and purses his lips thoughtfully. “So if Papa is forty-four and Daddy is — how old are you again, Daddy?”

“Younger than Papa,” Bitty replies with a smirk.

“But how old is that?”

“Yeah, Bits,” Jack chirps. “How old _is_ that?”

“Thirty-nine. Still a spring chicken,” Bitty says. 

“You’re not a chicken, you’re a person,” Carter says, confused.

“It’s an expression,” Jack says. “It means Daddy’s not old yet.” _Older_ , sure. But the faint lines around Bitty's eyes and bits of gray in his hair mean he _finally_ looks his age. In any case, Jack still can't get enough of him.

“ _Yet_ ,” Bitty snorts. Jack presses a reassuring kiss to the top of his head. He has a feeling Bitty’s been working himself up toward one of his semi-regular meltdowns over his age and general health, which always results in a full-blown fridge clean-out and a lot of reduced-calorie baking experiments. Jack hopes Bitty will at least wait until his birthday is over, because he wants cake.

Carter nods, even though Jack is pretty sure he doesn’t _quite_ understand. “So Papa is forty-four and Daddy is thirty-nine and I’m four and Birdy is two.”

“Right.” Bitty nods. “Good job.”

“And Papa Bob is older than dirt.”

“Carter!” Bitty gasps. “That’s not very kind.”

“But that’s what Papa Bob told me last week,” Carter protests. Jack hides a smile because it sounds exactly like something his father might say.

“Well, it still isn’t very nice. Papa Bob is … well-seasoned.”

Now Jack can barely keep it together. “Does that mean my mother is well-preserved?”

“Oh my lord, you are the absolute _worst_ ,” Bitty groans. “Carter, _do not_ repeat that to your grandparents.”

“You know they’ll get a kick out of it,” Jack says. His parents have taken to grandparenthood like ducks to water and think everything Carter and Birdy say is brilliant.

“Well, I prefer to stay in my in-laws’ good graces,” Bitty grumbles, though he’s smiling. Suddenly he gasps, nearly dropping his muffin. “Oh! I almost forgot!” He pulls the tray closer and plucks a single blue birthday candle from it. “Birdy, can you put this in Papa’s muffin?”

Birdy carefully sticks the candle in the top of the muffin while Bitty rummages in the nightstand on his side of the bed. “Knew I left one of these in here!” he says happily, brandishing a lighter. “Where’s that muffin?”

“Here!” Birdy calls sweetly, holding out the now-candle-topped muffin in her cupped hands.

“Thank you, Birdy. Can you give that back to Papa? Now, I’m going to light this very carefully while we sing.”

What follows is a hybrid English-French version of the birthday song, sung slightly off key by Bitty and Carter. Birdy sways back and forth and repeats the word “birfday.”

“Now you have to make a wish, Papa,” Carter says.

“Oh, I think I know what Papa’s gonna wish for,” Bitty says, hand creeping under the blankets and coming to rest on Jack’s thigh, stopping just short of plausible deniability.

“What are you gonna wish for?” Carter asks.

Jack swallows hard and looks at the tiny flame burning in front of him. He has everything he’s ever wanted right here.

 _I wish for it to always be like this_.

Jack blows out the candle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it -- the end of this story, and this series. I loved writing in this universe, and I'm a little sad it's coming to an end. Thank you to everyone who went along with this crazy concept, and stuck around through my sporadic updates this winter and spring. The writing of this coincided with some big life changes I didn't anticipate, and it took me a lot longer to get updates out than I had initially planned. My next big fic project will definitely be completed before I start posting! (But, I may post previews on Tumblr.)
> 
> Thank you again for all of the kind comments. My family has spent the past few months preparing for an out-of-state move, and on the most stressful days your comments really brightened my day and cheered me up. ❤️
> 
> I’m on Tumblr at [doggernaut](https://doggernaut.tumblr.com). Feel free to drop by and say hi!


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